RE: Linkbases, Topic Maps,and RDF Knowledge Bases -- help me und erstand, please

["Bullard, Claude L (Len)" <clbullar@ingr.com>]

From the perspective of already having a topic-rich database 
and tables of meta-data that are already available for 
creating topical views, the question for me is one of appropriateness 
for representing these to other applications.   For that 
work, I'd prefer topic maps/Xlinks.   It seems to make 
the most sense at the level of what needs to be shared, 
that is, the traversal semantics based on the relationships.
Using RDF would seem to duplicate more of the information 
at the lower levels of the database.  From that perspective, 
what I want to share is not the information in the database, 
but the shared views or controls for accessing and traversing it. 

I see RDF and tend to think of data mining and discovery.  I see Topic maps 
and tend to think of drill down and visualization.  RDF is closer 
to the system tables; topic maps closer to what is in the treeviews.

Len 
http://www.mp3.com/LenBullard

Ekam sat.h, Vipraah bahudhaa vadanti.
Daamyata. Datta. Dayadhvam.h


-----Original Message-----
From: Michael Champion [mailto:mike.champion@softwareag-usa.com]

So, does the world need all three?  Just RDF?  RDF+XLink? RDF+XTM?