Hi Jason,
I think one of the most interesting parts of the development of this
standard has been the proposed 'compliance guidance' for those who wish to
implement it. Experience suggests that the ease of implementation is crucial
to the wide adoption of the standard - so this is an area that needs careful
attention.
We've discussed (off list so far) the option that the standard could be made
available in various formats to suit the available technology, ie a flat
list of terms could be made available so that those who are operating a
simple system which would be able to comply with the standard from day one,
but with the more complex thesaurus type standard as something for us to
work towards.
Compliance to the *terms* in the standard therefore is seen as separate to
compliance to the full *structure* of the standard (and therefore some of
the more advanced retrieval options).
This is an interesting proposition, and has implications for the formats in
which we make our reference data available.
What does anyone else out there think?
Edmund
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