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<DIV>I think this is the idea of "communities". I.e. nothing is guaranteed to be forever. It relies on us as a community to keep it going indefinitely. So yes on the safe side, we could say "in the forseeable future", but on the idealistic side we would say "indefinitely". </DIV>
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<DIV>So I would reccommend staying with tdwg.org, as this ties the "domain" to a global community / an ideal / an aspiration, rather than to a commercial / funding based organisation (which could, even more readily, be terminated).</DIV>
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<DIV>Any "infrastrutcture" will need to be housed somewhere and, I guess, this will be up to the members of our community to chip in and provide the services required at the time (as GBIF have done recently).</DIV>
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<DIV>This probably all sounds a bit "idealistic", but I think ideals last longer than organisations, and longer than any specific technology for that matter (LSIDs, DNS, Internet, etc).</DIV>
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<DIV>Kevin<BR><BR>>>> "Chuck Miller" <Chuck.Miller@mobot.org> 1/12/2007 6:18 a.m. >>><BR></DIV>
<DIV style="COLOR: #000000">How to turn LSIDs into a clickable link guaranteed to work forever?<BR><BR>Rich's vision:<BR><A href="http://<some">http://<some</A> proxy server>.org/?urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act:1234<BR><BR>This sounds to me like a question more about networking infrastructure,<BR>than TDWG's charter about data exchange protocols and content standards.<BR>I have always presumed that TDWG's standards would work using whatever<BR>networking infrastructure was available to them - e.g. DNS, HTTP, local<BR>provider servers, etc. <BR><BR>But, then lsid.tdwg.org was created--a server. Servers are operational<BR>infrastructure. I don't think TDWG has (yet) a "forever" funding stream<BR>to enable operational infrastructure - ongoing operation of server room,<BR>system administrator, network connections. But, something like<BR>lsid.tdwg.org would serve a valuable purpose as Rich notes of enabling<BR>LSIDs as a clickable link in publications or other online sources.<BR><BR>Is there an existing international body that could operate a forever<BR>functioning LSID proxy (say like, proxy.lsid.org--which unfortunately is<BR>already lost to Lindsay-Strathmore Irrigation District)?<BR><BR>Maybe we will be forced to accept that there is no "forever" on the<BR>Internet and accept instead the "forseeable future". I would think for<BR>the forseeable future that GBIF would be a good place to put a new LSID<BR>infrastructure like this since they are in the "operations center"<BR>business already and TDWG is by charter not. So, maybe the proxy should<BR>be lsid.gbif.org?<BR><BR>Chuck<BR><BR><BR>-----Original Message-----<BR>From: tdwg-guid-bounces@lists.tdwg.org<BR>[<A href="mailto:tdwg-guid-bounces@lists.tdwg.org]">mailto:tdwg-guid-bounces@lists.tdwg.org]</A> On Behalf Of Richard Pyle<BR>Sent: Friday, November 30, 2007 6:39 AM<BR>To: 'Roger Hyam'; 'Roderic Page'<BR>Cc: tdwg-guid@lists.tdwg.org<BR>Subject: [tdwg-guid] Embedding LSID links within Publications<BR><BR><BR>Thank you, Roger, for launching the next conversation I wanted to start<BR>on<BR>this list (not to interrupt the previous conversation....but this one is<BR>actually more pressing for me right now): <BR><BR>> Would it be better to take the approach we have with LSIDs <BR>> where we always cite a proxied version?<BR>> <BR>> What do other people do?<BR><BR>As many of you already know, I'm planning to publish the description of<BR>five<BR>new species of Chromis in Zootaxa on Jan 1 to:<BR><BR>- launch ZooBank<BR>- Commemorate the 250th Anniversary of the start of Zoological<BR>Nomenclature<BR>- Create an "exemplar" cybertaxonomy publication<BR><BR>I was talking this up at Bratislava, and things are still on track.<BR>Anyone<BR>who wants to know more about the project, let me know and I'll send a<BR>document describing it in more detail.<BR><BR>For now, I'll just provide a basic synopsis: This publication will<BR>include<BR>the first 5 zoological names proactively registered in ZooBank. As such,<BR>there will be five ZooBank LSIDs, which I will want to include within<BR>the<BR>publication itself (published in both paper version to comply with ICZN<BR>Code<BR>rules; and as an online PDF version, which 99.9% of people will actually<BR>read). The plan is to have the PDF version marked up as much as<BR>possible,<BR>with taXMLit & TaxonX markup files, SDD files for the character data,<BR>ZooBank LSIDs, Images deposited in MorphBank, links to GenBank records<BR>for<BR>Barcode sequences, links to Museum specimen databases, links to BHL for<BR>literature cited, etc., etc.<BR><BR>So....this will be a document intended to show what could be possible<BR>with<BR>all this TDWG stuff we've all be working on for all these years -- i.e.,<BR>how<BR>cybertaxonomy could/should be done in the age of the internet.<BR><BR>Now, the PDF file itself will be rather simple -- a standard PDF file as<BR>per<BR>normal Zootaxa practice -- except in this document, there will be MANY<BR>embedded links that allow point-and-click access to all sorts of online<BR>resources -- each of which will in some way showcase TDWG and TDWG-like<BR>standards.<BR><BR>A bunch of these links will be LSIDs (e.g., ZooBank LSIDs, plus maybe<BR>others). However, some of them may be other links (DOIs, URLs, etc.).<BR>All<BR>HTTP and other self-resolving links will be pretty straightforward, but<BR>I'm<BR>not sure yet how to embed links associated with the LSIDs.<BR><BR>Obviously, LSIDs are not, by themselves, completely self-resolving via<BR>most<BR>web browsers, so simply embedding the LSID as a link will not do the<BR>average<BR>user much good. Thus, I'm now thinking of how I can make the LSIDs<BR>"clickable" from the PDF, to allow the cicker/user to be directed to<BR>something meangiful. And that has caused me to think a lot about HTTP<BR>proxies for LSIDs.<BR><BR>Thus, assuming I have a ZooBank LSID that is<BR>urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act:1234,<BR>how do I represent that as a "clickable" link? One way to do this would<BR>be<BR>to embed the LSID within the TDWG HTTP proxy:<BR><BR><A href="http://lsid.tdwg.org/?urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act:1234">http://lsid.tdwg.org/?urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act:1234</A><BR><BR>However, what I'm shooting for is to have a document that can, as best<BR>as<BR>possible, withstand the test of time, such that 250 years from now, some<BR>or<BR>all of those embedded links will still work (I know, I know -- they<BR>won't --<BR>but humor me....) I'm a little neverous about simply assuming that the<BR>TDWG<BR>LSID resolver will still be around in 250 years. Besides, 99.9% of<BR>users<BR>will look at the returned RDF and scratch their heads.<BR><BR>My gut feeling is that LSIDs have a better chance of surviving the<BR>long-term<BR>than URLs do. And following this premise, the LSID<BR>"urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act:1234" will only survive as long as the<BR>authority<BR>"zoobank.org" survives (in theory), so it seems to me a slightly more<BR>appropriate solution would be to build a custom LSID resolver at<BR>zoobank.org, and thereby format the clickable link as:<BR><BR><A href="http://zoobank.org/?lsid=urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act:1234">http://zoobank.org/?lsid=urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act:1234</A><BR><BR>Does this make sense to anyone? Am I missing something fundamental<BR>here?<BR>Is there a better way to embed clickable links to LSIDs in a PDF<BR>document?<BR><BR>I have a bunch of other questions to follow up with, but let's tackle<BR>this<BR>one first.<BR><BR>Many thanks!!<BR><BR>Aloha,<BR>Rich<BR><BR>Richard L. Pyle, PhD<BR>Database Coordinator for Natural Sciences<BR> and Associate Zoologist in Ichthyology<BR>Department of Natural Sciences, Bishop Museum<BR>1525 Bernice St., Honolulu, HI 96817<BR>Ph: (808)848-4115, Fax: (808)847-8252<BR>email: deepreef@bishopmuseum.org<BR><A href="http://hbs.bishopmuseum.org/staff/pylerichard.html">http://hbs.bishopmuseum.org/staff/pylerichard.html</A><BR><BR><BR><BR>_______________________________________________<BR>tdwg-guid mailing list<BR>tdwg-guid@lists.tdwg.org<BR><A href="http://lists.tdwg.org/mailman/listinfo/tdwg-guid">http://lists.tdwg.org/mailman/listinfo/tdwg-guid</A><BR>_______________________________________________<BR>tdwg-guid mailing list<BR>tdwg-guid@lists.tdwg.org<BR><A href="http://lists.tdwg.org/mailman/listinfo/tdwg-guid">http://lists.tdwg.org/mailman/listinfo/tdwg-guid</A><BR></DIV></BODY></HTML>