xml-dev - Re: Services-based automation (WAS RE: Realistic proposals to the W3C?)

[Jonathan Borden <jborden@mediaone.net>]

Gavin Thomas Nicol

>
> > RDF schemas are intended to complement not replace XML schemas. An RDF
> > schema defines a semantic hierarchy, or network, of element names. The
URI
> > created by concatenating the namespace URI to the element name
> > identifies an RDF Schema Class to which the instance belongs, or may
> > identifiy an RDF Schema Property.
>
> And hence they are broken.

[well known example regarding DNS entries changing ownership snipped ...]

[shrug]

Ok so the semantic web is broken because the web itself is broken. On the
other hand natural language is broken, and heiroglyphics are broken because
the meaning of words change and languages themselves come and go, and
records get destroyed and...

I suppose the answer is to either:

a) use a persistant URL http://www.purl.org
b) figure out a better DNS/URL mechanism.

Just because a vocabulary exists, or exists this moment, doesn't mean that
it is the vocabulary you wish to use for documents you intend to archive. If
you are concerned with such problems, you may wish to restrict your usage of
schemas to those published by well known organizations, e.g. nlm.nih.gov or
whatever you trust as a) an organization that defines the 'true' vocabulary
and b) is going to stay around

I'm not trying to suggest that RDF or RDF Schemas somehow magically solve
the world's problems. All I'm trying to do is give a few basics about RDF
and RDF Schemas and how they relate to semantic networks and ultimately the
semantic web as I see it.

Jonathan Borden
The Open Healthcare Group
http://www.openhealth.org