Re: D-AC009 discussion points and proposal

As Semantic Web champion, I'll jump in where I see a need.

On Tue, May 21, 2002 at 01:27:39PM -0400, Christopher Ferris wrote:
> D-AC009
> "is aligned with the semantic web initiative at W3C."
> 
> IBM: I think it is fine to be aligned with the Semantic Web so long as it does
> not interfere with achieving important business goals and satisfying
> accepted scenarios for Web services.

I think that as a group, we've got to move past this "Web services are
business, the Semantic Web is research" view that I've heard so much of.
Web services and the Semantic Web will bump into one another often
during our work here, because they are two ways of solving the same
problem; machine-to-machine integration over the Web.

I want to re-emphasize again, that we are not starting our work from
scratch.  We are starting it with an existing architecture, the Web,
that our charter requires that we integrate cleanly with.  If we find
two ways to solve a particular problem, and one fits better with the
Web than the other, then we should go with that one.

Would anybody in the WG disagree with this?

> I'm not saying that I know of any conflicts at the moment, but I do not
> want to agree with the restriction without due diligence to confirm that
> there are none and proper prioritization should there be a conflict.
> 
> Just to clarify, I do not think that we should stray from alighnment with
> the Semantic Web without substantive cause and having already tried to work
> through a resolution to any conflict with the Semantic Web Activity in a
> reasonable amount of time.

> INTEL (jdm): There were recent statements regarding the status of Semantic
> Web as a "work in progress not yet ready for standardization." Is it
> appropriate to place such a high level of "alignment" for the WSAWG's effort
> to the "Semantic Web?"

I recall seeing that statement somewhere (do you have a reference?), but
I disagree quite strongly.  The basics behind the Semantic Web have been
in the research stage for many years; I don't know the distant history,
but I'd guess it's been around in various forms for the past 30 years or
so.  The past work just needs a few "tweaks" in order to bring it to the
wide open Web.  The time is definitely right for standardization, IMO.

> <proposal from="chair">
> "is not unnecessarily misaligned with the Semantic Web initiative"
> </proposal>

I suppose I could live with that.  IMO, our directive to integrate
cleanly with Web architecture will end up driving Semantic-Web based
solutions anyhow.

MB
-- 
Mark Baker, CTO, Idokorro Mobile (formerly Planetfred)
Ottawa, Ontario, CANADA.               distobj@acm.org
http://www.markbaker.ca        http://www.idokorro.com

Received on Tuesday, 21 May 2002 14:28:45 UTC