[sc34wg3] Structuring the topic map standards

[Lars Marius Garshol]

* Patrick Durusau
| 
| I think the names given various "parts" of the work on topic maps in
| prior documents can be misleading. There was (is) little or no
| agreement on the details of what goes with each name (the "devil
| being in the details") so I would find it helpful if you could say
| what you think the various parts you agree or disagree with will
| contain and how they relate to other parts.

Actually, this has been debated by SC34 WG3 several times, first in
Berlin, and later in Orlando, and each time we documented our
agreements in writing:

  <URL: http://www.y12.doe.gov/sgml/sc34/document/0278.htm >
  <URL: http://www.y12.doe.gov/sgml/sc34/document/0323.htm >
 
| For example, you mention the SAM, which I assume you are equating
| that with the document that you have been writing which is bound to
| the XML Infoset? 

Yes. 

(It is not bound to the XML Infoset, however. It uses the information
set *formalism*, which the XML Infoset also does. The formalism and
the several models created with it are not the same thing. N0328, the
draft deserialization specification for XTM, uses the XML Infoset,
however.)

| A topic map API using the XML Infoset is an important thing, [...]

It's not an API. An API is something completely different. It's a data
model. 

| [...] but I don't think its place in the world of topic maps has yet
| been fixed.

What *do* you think, then? We have a documented agreement on how we
intended to structure the standard. There was a proposal to modify
that in Baltimore, but that proposal was neither properly discussed
nor described in sufficient detail that anyone could be certain what
it was actually saying. So until something new is put on the table I
assume the agreement in N0278/N0323 stands.

Do you want to change that in any way? If so, how? Do you want to have
a debate about how to change them? If so, start it.

My point of view has been consistent ever since the Berlin meeting and
I have yet to see any reason to change it. I have also tried to
explain it over and over again and have even done so in writing a
number of times, most notably in N0323. It would be useful to know if
you have read that before I repeat myself one more time.

| I tried to start such a thread saying what I thought about the
| principles of topic maps and a description of the topic map model
| using a particular methodology. I am still working on what I think
| the other bits would be and their relationships to other parts. 

Good.

| I would prefer to write the next parts in conversation with what
| others see as the various parts of the topic map effort. That is
| difficult to do when people use names that have no shared
| understanding. 

I think we do have a common understanding and that we have had one for
more than a year already. You may not be party to it, but my
impression is that most people have been on the same page. If I am
mistaken in that assumption, please, everyone, correct me. And please
don't stop at correcting me, also tell me just what we are supposed to
do to get everyone onto the same page. I've tried everything I can
think of to fix this and if it hasn't worked I'm out of ideas for what
to do.

-- 
Lars Marius Garshol, Ontopian         <URL: http://www.ontopia.net >
GSM: +47 98 21 55 50                  <URL: http://www.garshol.priv.no >