On Thu, 16 Jul 1998, Simon Cox wrote:
> Mary Larsgaard wrote:
> >
> > Many thanks for your work in putting together the documents for
> > DC Type and DC Format. Re Format: Alexandria Digital Library started
> > out using MIME types as our operating list, and quickly found out that
> > they were insufficient. You might want something like, " use MIME types
> > whenever possible."
>
> Point taken. But did you realise that it is relatively
> straightforward to add types to the MIME list ...
> Did the ADL project consider augmenting the list?
> Are the anomalies sufficiently well understood that
> this is something about which there would be enough
> agreement to consider such a course of action?
Having just registered MARC as a MIME type, I'm not sure I'd say it's that
easy to do.
> > Re the Type document: how about some other word/phrase
> > than "Data"? Everything is data, and especially in the context
> > of Web resources, everything is data. Perhaps something that means
> > "database and spreadsheet fodder."
>
> Hmm. In principle I take your point, but in this case
> I believe that the word "data" is a label - and the
> semantics are sufficiently distinct, given that many of
> the boundaries are a little bit fuzzy anyway.
> We are talking "simple resource discovery" here.
> Do you have any other suggestions?
I agree that "data" is not the best because you could consider text data.
However, I'm not sure what a better word is. The term "data" as we're
using it in the minimalist Type list covers the two categories that MARC
has in the Type of computer file element: numeric data and bibliographic
data. I'm not sure what other word could be used to cover these concepts.
The important thing is the definition since we'll never find a term that
would suit everyone.
Rebecca
> --
> __________________________________________________
> Dr Simon Cox - Australian Geodynamics Cooperative Research Centre
> CSIRO Exploration & Mining, PO Box 437, Nedlands, WA 6009 Australia
> T: +61 8 9389 8421 F: +61 8 9389 1906 [log in to unmask]
> http://www.ned.dem.csiro.au/SimonCox/
>
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