what should RDDL/RDF look like?

Dave Beckett wrote:
>
> This XHTML and RDF[/XML?] integration issue is news to me.  I don't
> think it is something that RDF Core has been aware of, or at least
> not highly aware.
>
> Non-starter for what purpose?  I can't answer that question.  RDF is
> just a technology; it is a non-starter for many purposes that don't
> fit what it was designed for.
>

Although this thread is straying off topic, it started out with a proposal
to update RDDL from its current XHTML + XLink to XHTML + RDF. A critereon
that is important to several folks here is that the namespace description
language both human and machine readable and writable. Certainly if we can
find an XHTML + RDF version of RDDL that is easier for people to read and
write than http://www.rddl.org/ that would be a win all around, from the POV
of XML folk that want to author namespace qualified documents, and who want
to describe these namespaces, as well as for RDF folk who presumably have a
need to describe their terms -- we'd have an improved capability to describe
terms in RDF/S/OWL but in a format which can be read in a browser. Now some
people may say that such a dual use format is not appropriate, rather that
XML folk go off and do their XML thing with their own XML namespaces and
that RDF folk go off and do their own thing with their RDF namespaces.
Perhaps.

[[
I do find this a bit more compelling than the use-case presented by
Jonathan based on webont's postponed requirement for complex XSD
datatypes (If I recall it correctly).
]]

If I don't always directly articulate it, you will find that a common theme
across my posts is a desire to improve the integration between XML and
RDF -- well, I like reuse and things to work together in general, but these
are two good technologies which at the moment don't really work together.
Such an integration _could_ be improved in a variety of places.

In any case, it is my impression, and I am sure that I'll be quickly
corrected if I am wrong, that Tim felt he should be able to relatively
easily develop a version of RDDL using RDF, something which per se does not
require changes to RDF nor XHTML themselves. There is a TAG action item to
do so. If we can do it correctly, and if people were to find it easier to
read and write than http://www.rddl.org/ I'd be more than thrilled.

Jonathan

Received on Wednesday, 13 November 2002 08:06:05 UTC