Re: URIs versus URI references [was: My top two issues]

> I'm inclined to think there's a closely-related family of
> issues here that might reward exploration.  Recently, the 
> usage of URI machinery has spread across the landscape: 
> XML namespaces, RDF's slight variation on that, XLink 
> role/arcrole (see RDDL at http://www.rddl.org), and so on.  
> 
> Some of the decisions that arise when you're doing this are:
> 
> - relative or absolute?
> - fragments OK or not? 
> - URNs sometimes always or never?

.. and other non-HTTP URI schemes.

> - the trick that RDF does of conventionally using a trailing #
>   and relying on concatenation for finer-grain identification
>   (not quite the same issue as fragments?)

I'd say it's a different issue.  Concatenation, whether with "#" or
"/", needs some clarification.  I'm fuzzy on it.  For example, how
does it interact with XML Base?

> There have been some awfully extended debates around these 
> things, and I think some dubious results - I've never been
> happy about the RDF trick.  In any case, since the URI
> seems increasingly to be at the centre of everything, some
> decision procedures on how to use them properly would be 
> useful.
> 
> How important is this task in the spectrum of things to which
> the TAG could turn its attention?

IMO, extremely important.  But until the other issues have been
presented and prioritized, it's hard to know where it'll end up.

>  And a related issue - is
> this maybe the IETF's problem, not ours?  I don't know. -Tim

I think the IETF must have a role in any clarification effort, but I'd
prefer to see it kick in officially after the TAG has documented its
position.  Of course, the "usual suspects" in IETF land will have an
opportunity to contribute to that work on www-tag, but I think it's
important that the W3C assert its opinion (which has historically been,
and will likely remain, quite different than that of many IETF
participants - e.g. utility of HTTP URI scheme).

MB
-- 
Mark Baker, Chief Science Officer, Planetfred, Inc.
Ottawa, Ontario, CANADA.      mbaker@planetfred.com
http://www.markbaker.ca   http://www.planetfred.com

Received on Wednesday, 19 December 2001 13:50:19 UTC