RE: httpRange-14

 

 -----Original Message----- 
 From: ext Chris Lilley [mailto:chris@w3.org] 
 Sent: Mon 2003-08-04 16:51 
 To: Mark Baker 
 Cc: www-tag@w3.org 
 Subject: Re: httpRange-14
 
 
 An interesting result of Roy's argument is that resources, since they
 cannot be observed directly, can only be inferred through observation
 of the representations that they have returned over time.
 
 I think that is a valuable observation and leads further to a
 principle that I find clarifying, though it may upset some: resources
 are inherently second class objects. URIs are first class objects, and
 may be stored, transferred, compared for equality and so forth. So can
 resource representations (and proxy caches do this all the time).
 
 Resources, though, are a derived abstraction. You can't observe them
 directly, or measure them, or compare them. You can compare their
 identifiers, but not the resources themselves. Their meaning, the
 abstraction that they convey, is reverse engineered from observation
 or from shared social discourse. The meaning is not observable from
 the identifier in isolation, only from the usage of this identifier.
 
 Naturally, social usage of an identifier is influenced by the
 representations returned from it.
 
 Consistency, then, is a social effect where observations on the usage
 of the identifier and observations on the returned resources are
 substantially in agreement. Consistency is an analogue quantity, not a
 binary one - consistency can be greater or lesser, can be argued
 about, has shades of meaning, and whether the consistency is good
 enough depends on the use that will be made of it.
 
 

Very well put. And SW descriptions of those resources, using RDF, OWL, etc. can aid in the general understanding of what those resources are and can be part of a more precise social interaction regarding those resources.

Cheers,

Patrick

Received on Tuesday, 5 August 2003 07:52:33 UTC