I basically agree with what Peter says here... arbitrary elaboration of
dot.kludge syntax is unlikely to be useful beyond the confines of a single
application, though its easy to build a case that makes it appealing
locally.
Far better that we apply schemes in a consistent way that allows the
invocation of publically known substructure and gives us a way to extract
the "dumbed-down" value of the element as well. Then we can get the basic
value, and from applications that know a bit more (Jim Weinheimer's
creator-with-date example), we can take advantage of a structured authority
record to do more.
stu
-----Original Message-----
From: [log in to unmask] [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Wednesday, May 19, 1999 3:11 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Schema definitions and subelements (was [dchtml] new (18 May)
draft)
Help me out if I'm in left field here ... but just because we haven't
gotten far enough along yet to define a syntax that would allow us to
compare schema definitions does not mean that it _can't_ be done.
IMHO we're a little 'out-of-band' with a field like Creator.date_of_birth.
Haven't we come around to understanding that the creator's date of birth
doesn't really belong in the resource ... it belongs in some sort of
authority (metadata) record for the creator using an extended metadata
schema (say vcard). If you think about it, putting date of birth (of the
creator) in the metadata (of the resource) breaks the 1:1 rule.
I thought that (eventually) schema definitions were intended to allow
search/agent software to find equivalent elements that have different names
- say GILS.DateLastModified = DC.Date.Modified. Granted, the
language/syntax to do this is a big question mark - but it's not
unsolvable. I don't _think_ anyone ever expects the schema definitions to
magically make search engines understand subelements that are a total
disconnect.
One more thing ... should we be designing DC with the limitations of
existing search engine/spider technology as the measuring stick? Shouldn't
we design it to do what it should and let the technology sort itself out?
If you believe Tim Berner's Lee - the Internet will evolve from a big
document to a big database. This could significantly change the
search/spider paradigm anyway.
Pete Winn
Knowledge Management InformationTechnologies
Information Services International - Los Angeles, CA
Email: [log in to unmask]
Voice: (973)691-3853 (MTO ext. 3853)
Fax: (310)446-1626
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