Re: NORZIG proposed new bib-1 Use attributes

> Date: Wed, 19 Mar 2003 10:07:59 -0500
> From: Shuh Barbara <barbara.shuh@nlc-bnc.ca>
>
> By proposing such extensions to the bib-1 attribute set, you are
> negating all the work that has been done on the development of the
> new attribute architecture and the bib-2 attribute set.

Hi Barbara.

I am very sympathetic to your complaint about the AA and BIB-2 being
overlooked, and I very much agree that we should all be doing all we
can to ensure that these unarguably superior technologies be used in
preference to BIB-1 wherever appropriate.

That said, I get the impression that the NORZIG people have a system
already established, and that they merely want to extend it (if any
NORZIGgers are on this list, maybe they can confirm or deny?)  If
that's correct, then it seems a bit harsh to require them to throw out
all their existing search-profiling and start from scratch with the
Attribute Architecture.

So I'm really keen on the AA -- you'll have noticed that I used it and
it alone for the search specifications in both the Zthes profile
(zthes.z3950.org) and ZeeRex (explain.z3950.org) -- but I don't think
we can hope to successfully impose it on communities that are already
90% of the way through implementation.

> I note that in the recently released specs for an IMS Digital
> Repositories Interoperability specification
> http://www.imsglobal.org, there are guidelines for the use of Z39.50
> and a proposal for an extensive extension of bib-1 for IMS
> Meta-Data.  Why not take the opportunity to use the new attribute
> architecture there?

The only reference I could find to Z39.50 on that site was in the IMS
Digital Repositories White Paper at
	http://www.imsglobal.org/imsdr_whitepaper_v1p6.html
which says:

	Searching allows the portal to send the same query to
	many content providers, retrieving results from each,
	merging them, and then presenting them to the
	user.  Searching is facilitated through the use of
	Z39.50 and the Bath Profile.  It is not necessary for
	portals to talk directly to content providers in all
	cases - brokers may take queries from portals and fan
	them out to multiple content providers.  A broker uses
	Z39.50 to talk to both the portal and the content
	provider.

It doesn't seem unreasonable to me that this project, in which Z39.50
appears to play a very small part, should use the Bath profile, which
has a great deal of international recognition.

(What I do think is an absolute crying shame is that Bath decided to
go with BIB-1 in the first place, when BIB-2 was -- just -- available
to be used instead.  That was the moment of opportunity to Save The
World.)

By the way, none of this should be construed to mean that I am
particularly fond of the specific access points that the NORZIG
propose.  I'll comment separately on them.

 _/|_	 _______________________________________________________________
/o ) \/  Mike Taylor   <mike@miketaylor.org.uk>   www.miketaylor.org.uk
)_v__/\  "Oh, don't be so sentimental mother, things explode every day"
	 -- Monty Python.

--
Listen to my wife's new CD of kids' music, _Child's Play_, at
	http://www.pipedreaming.org.uk/childsplay/

Received on Wednesday, 19 March 2003 10:53:47 UTC