Re: URI resolver was Re: RDDL and XML Schemas Proposed Recommendation

[Tim Bray <tbray@textuality.com>]

At 05:18 PM 25/03/01 -0500, Michael Mealling wrote:
>While it may be safely lost on people (users?), if its lost on system 
>designers you get huge interoperability problems....

An example would be helpful to avoid us designers better understand
the kind of mistake to avoid.

>Yes it does sound academic but its this exact subtlety that caused
>so much consumed bandwidth over the XML Namespaces issue. It is
>very tempting to say things like "I should be able to tell if
>two URIs identify the same resource" but what you find is that
>if you don't pay attention to the subtleties in that assertion you
>end up with a system that breaks a large number of applications very
>quickly.

I don't think anyone in the namespace debate made any claims
quite that oversimplified... once again, an example of the
kind of errors you see happening (or having a high likelihood
of happening) would be real helpful.

>It all goes back to that question: What does a URI identify and 
>is that relationship 1:1? 

... and is the question about 1:1 meaningful :)?  I don't think
I'm really disagreeing with what you're saying, just whining 
that the argument is on too theoretical a level. -Tim