On Wed, 12 Feb 2003, Phil Barker wrote:

> You can now find the UKCMF under the "guides" section of the CETIS METADATA
> website: http://metadata.cetis.ac.uk/guides/

Phil,
(at a slight tangent) the document about Identifiers at

  http://metadata.cetis.ac.uk/guides/uids.doc

misses out Handles

  http://www.handle.net/

which is the system that underpins the DOI.  Crucially, the Handle system
itself is an open technology (I think) in that anyone can create/register
a handle - the DOI use of handles is closed, you have to buy into the DOI
world before you can create DOIs.

I note that the UKCMF suggests using DOIs.  I would tend to disagree with
that approach, preferring PURLs, Handles or simply sensible use of URIs
(as per OAI).  However, I'll send in my detailed comments about the UKCMF
separately.

I think it is also important to consider issues around the identification
of 'resources' vs. the identification of the 'metadata records about those
resources' and whether there is any inherent reason why the identifier
schemes used for those two functions should necessarily be different.  I
don't think they should be, except is special cases (e.g. books and
journals).  Both the ISBN and ISSN can be encoded as URIs.

It is also important to distinguish an 'identifier' from the 'resolution
service' that returns one or more associated 'locators'.  The LOM allows
the metadata record to carry both the identifier of the resource, the
locator of the resource and the identifier of the metadata record.  My
view is that we should not use it to explicitly carry the locator. (again,
this is really a comment about the UKCMF, so I'll send it separately).
Resolving the identifier is a separate problem (separate from the
discovery of the metadata record), best carried out by a separate
resolution service.

Andy.

> Phil.
>
> Phil Barker wrote:
> > Hello David, hello all,
> > Firstly, for those of you who weren't at the Manchest X4L meeting and
> > haven't heard Lorna talking about it, here's what the UKCMF is:
> >
> > --quote--
> > X4L UK Common Metadata Framework.
> >
> > This application profile of the IEEE's Learning Object Metadata standard
> > has been developed by Learning and Teaching Scotland and CETIS for use
> > by the X4L Programme.  This framework represents a common minimum set of
> > elements that all projects can use in order to promote interoperability.
> > Projects are free to add other LOM elements and vocabularies to this
> > subset in order to meet their own specific requirements.  Although use
> > of X4L/UKCMF is not mandatory for X4L projects, its adoption is strongly
> > recommended to help achieve the aims of the programme as a whole. The
> > X4L UKCMF will be implemented by the Jorum+ X4L development bay.
> > --unquote--
> >
> > The first complete draft was sent around the group of people who had had
> > input to the development on Friday last week, and the first public
> > airing was Monday this week. I don't know the timetable for further
> > dissemination, but am trying to find out.
> >
> > There will be a presentation on the draft UK CMF at the next MDR SIG
> > meeting, but more on that in a short while!
> >
> > Phil.
>
> --
> Phil Barker                            Learning Technology Advisor
>       ICBL, School of Mathematical and Computer Sciences
>       Mountbatten Building, Heriot-Watt University,
>       Edinburgh, EH14 4AS
>       Tel: 0131 451 3278    Fax: 0131 451 3327
>       Web: http://www.icbl.hw.ac.uk/~philb/
>

Andy
--
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