Re: What should I use: RDF, DAML+OIW, OWL, XTP, Future Ontology Spec...

From: "Jimmy Cerra" <jimbobbs@hotmail.com>
Subject: What should I use: RDF, DAML+OIW, OWL, XTP, Future Ontology Spec...
Date: Sun, 13 Apr 2003 15:47:40 -0400

> Ack!  There seems to be an explosion of Semantic Web standards being
> created.  The extreme genesis of the different specifications is making
> the decision to use one difficult.  What should I use?  RDF is the most
> widely used (thanks to RSS).  DAML+OWL provides a lot of missing
> features.  However, OWL will soon supplement DAML.  Still, RDF - and to
> a lesser extent DAML - are current standards and are implemented in a
> variety of applications.  Then there are Topic Maps, another 'mature'
> specification in a parallel domain as the W3C's efforts.  Finally, XLink
> also seems to provide an ad-hoc method to encode the Semantic Graphs
> between resources.
> 
> I reiterate, what should I use?  Should I use OWL since for future
> compatibility?  Should I use RDF since it's the most widely used?  How
> about Topic Maps or XLinks?
> 
> This TLA soup of the Semantic Web is driving me crazy.  I'm tempted to
> eschew everything in favor of SVG and encode the graphs as graphics!!!
> (I'm just joking... ;)
> 
> Can anyone help me put all of this into perspective?
> 
> --
> James F. Cerra 

Well would you expect the Semantic Web to be different from any other area?

There are many programming languages, suitable for different uses.  
There are many operating systems, suitable for different uses.  
There are many computers, suitable for different uses.  
There are many logics, suitable for different uses.  

There are (not very) many (yet) Semantic Languages, suitable for different
uses.  If you need to represent information as triples, you can use RDF.
If you also need to represent simple information about classes and
properties, you can use RDFS.  If you also need to represent more-complex
information about classes and properties, you can use OWL.  There are other
representational choices, such as Topic Maps.  

So which language to use depends mostly on what you need to represent.  You
choice of language ranges from RDF at the least-expressive end, through
RDFS, to OWL.  I expect that more-expressive languages will become official
parts of the Semantic Web in the future.

(By the way, I don't think that XLink or XML Schema fit into this.  The XML
specifications are about documents, not about representation.)

Peter F. Patel-Schneider
Bell Labs Research
Lucent Technologies

Received on Sunday, 13 April 2003 21:51:09 UTC