John Kunze (quoted from Jon Knight's response):
| > Two element qualifiers that are almost completely undefined in the original
| > DC specification are "Type" and "Identifier". There's one lousy sentence:
| >
| > "In the example below, it is assumed that the sub-elements Type
| > and Identifier have been defined." ... [ 4 examples appear also ]
| >
| > This is simply not enough to work with. The User Guide Group was unable
| > to describe them without making too many second guesses as to how they
| > interacted with the Role qualifier and other elements in general, and so
| > it dropped them. Pending meta2's formulation of clearer term definitions
| > and goals, these qualifiers needlessly complicate the DC and are too hard
| > to explain, so I propose to merge Type's function into Role and omit
| > any mention of Type and Identifier qualifiers from the DC spec.
These qualifiers apply only to Relation, don't they? There they seem to
be necessary. I totally missed at the time that the word "Identifier"
is being used at two levels, which may cause confusion. However, the
semantics of Identifier as a qualifier on Relation are plausibly the
same as those for Identifier as an element. Type might become
RelationType, though.
Looking at
http://www.oclc.org:5046/oclc/research/conferences/metadata/dublin_core_report.html
I see that Source's content may be this same Identifier thingie. and
that for both Relation and Source, Identifier should not be described
as a pointer only.
Terry Allen Fujitsu Software Corp. [log in to unmask]
"In going on with these experiments, how many pretty systems do we build,
which we soon find outselves obliged to destroy?" - Benjamin Franklin
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