Re: [tdwg-content] [Fwd: Re: NCD and DwC]
I'm moving this conversation into tdwg-content to weave together the conversation for all.
Sorry about the confusion. The conversation has progressed in this side thread beyond my proposal in the tdwg-content list.
I'm not sure what you mean by shield, but yes, the idea is to make sure they are minimally affected by whatever may happen to NCD. To me that means using a refinement, technically.
Yes, at least from the process perspective there is still an opportunity to rework NCD, as it hasn't fully progressed through the standards process. It is now at essentially the same stage as Darwin Core, though I expect Darwin Core to be ready for Executive Review this week, while NCD may take longer.
I agree that consistent conventions would be nice across standards. Ultimately it will help all of our stakeholders. But DwC is the first to follow the vocabulary-first paradigm in the footsteps of Dublin Core. I can imagine inertia or resistance for other standards in the TDWG family.
On Tue, Sep 15, 2009 at 10:41 AM, renato@cria.org.br wrote:
Hi John,
Initially I had the impression that you repeated the same proposal that you sent to the mailing list, but now I see what you mean. Sorry.
So the idea is to actually shield DwC terms, not exactly refine the NCD ones. I would prefer to see NCD terms being directly used, but I understand your position. Although we have the chance to change NCD, I would feel better knowing Roger's opinion about this. It's a strange situation because in theory we shouldn't be changing NCD. It is already fully ratified (or am I wrong, Wouter?). So we shouldn't expect changes, unless NCD decides to release a new version and go through the TDWG process all over again.
I definitely agree that we should try to define and use the same namespace and naming conventions across our standards. -- Renato
I think my solution is already congruent with what you are saying, Renato. My proposed solution is to declare these DwC terms as formal refinements of the NCD terms. If the NCD terms change between now and when that standard gets ratified, all DwC will have to do is change the refines attributes - no one in implementation will be affected. That aside, I think it would be best if NCD followed the established DC pattern of term identification, not just for consistency, but also for usability. I can definitely foresee people wanting to use the fielded text solution for sharing NCD records, and the way the terms are identified now that will be a mess.
Here are the terms I have proposed and their formal refinements.
dwc:institutionCode refines http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/terms/Institution#Code dwc:institutionID refines http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/terms/Institution#Id dwc:collectionCode refines http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/terms/Collection#Code dwc:collectionID refines http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/terms/Collection#Id dwc:ownerInstitutionCode refines http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/terms/Institution#Code
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Renato et al.,
Just a quick point about the status of and revising NCD. I think it is ratified, but revising it does not mean that it has to go through the whole process. Our process leaves open the possibility that changes can be made to improve a standard or correct errors without going through the entire review process, IF the changes are deemed to be conceptually minor and/or broadly supported. The executive committee, in consultation with the TAG, has the authority to approve a new version. It must be a new version, however (at least under the previous concept of the process).
-Stan
-----Original Message----- From: tdwg-content-bounces@lists.tdwg.org [mailto:tdwg-content- bounces@lists.tdwg.org] On Behalf Of John R. WIECZOREK Sent: Tuesday, September 15, 2009 10:51 AM To: renato@cria.org.br Cc: TDWG Content Mailing List Subject: Re: [tdwg-content] [Fwd: Re: NCD and DwC]
I'm moving this conversation into tdwg-content to weave together the conversation for all.
Sorry about the confusion. The conversation has progressed in this side thread beyond my proposal in the tdwg-content list.
I'm not sure what you mean by shield, but yes, the idea is to make sure they are minimally affected by whatever may happen to NCD. To me that means using a refinement, technically.
Yes, at least from the process perspective there is still an opportunity to rework NCD, as it hasn't fully progressed through the standards process. It is now at essentially the same stage as Darwin Core, though I expect Darwin Core to be ready for Executive Review this week, while NCD may take longer.
I agree that consistent conventions would be nice across standards. Ultimately it will help all of our stakeholders. But DwC is the first to follow the vocabulary-first paradigm in the footsteps of Dublin Core. I can imagine inertia or resistance for other standards in the TDWG family.
On Tue, Sep 15, 2009 at 10:41 AM, renato@cria.org.br wrote:
Hi John,
Initially I had the impression that you repeated the same proposal
that
you sent to the mailing list, but now I see what you mean. Sorry.
So the idea is to actually shield DwC terms, not exactly refine the
NCD
ones. I would prefer to see NCD terms being directly used, but I understand your position. Although we have the chance to change NCD,
I
would feel better knowing Roger's opinion about this. It's a strange situation because in theory we shouldn't be changing NCD. It is
already
fully ratified (or am I wrong, Wouter?). So we shouldn't expect
changes,
unless NCD decides to release a new version and go through the TDWG process all over again.
I definitely agree that we should try to define and use the same
namespace
and naming conventions across our standards.
Renato
I think my solution is already congruent with what you are saying, Renato. My proposed solution is to declare these DwC terms as formal refinements of the NCD terms. If the NCD terms change between now
and
when that standard gets ratified, all DwC will have to do is change the refines attributes - no one in implementation will be affected. That aside, I think it would be best if NCD followed the established DC pattern of term identification, not just for consistency, but
also
for usability. I can definitely foresee people wanting to use the fielded text solution for sharing NCD records, and the way the terms are identified now that will be a mess.
Here are the terms I have proposed and their formal refinements.
dwc:institutionCode refines
http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/terms/Institution#Code
dwc:institutionID refines
http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/terms/Institution#Id
dwc:collectionCode refines
http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/terms/Collection#Code
dwc:collectionID refines http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/terms/Collection#Id dwc:ownerInstitutionCode refines http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/terms/Institution#Code
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tdwg-content mailing list tdwg-content@lists.tdwg.org http://lists.tdwg.org/mailman/listinfo/tdwg-content
"I agree that consistent conventions would be nice across standards."
I second this opinion! It seems some standards are based around XML/XSD, some around RDF, some are strongly influenced by the TDWG core ontology (LSID vocs), which is not even a standard. etc, etc
It would be good to have a recommended approach to generating a standard specification (or is there one already??). Eg - use the "Core TDWG model" to guide you standard development - reuse any existing standards as much as possible, eg DC, FOAF - generate specific Use Cases for the problem domain - use UML (or similar) to model your problem domain - use RDF or OWL to develop classes and properties for the UML model - feedback new ideas/models to the "Core model" - generate recommendations for use of the standard model in particular use cases, eg "Use the Observation TDWG class, with the GUID specified in the dc:identifier field, owner in dc:creator, to transfer specimen data from herbarium A to herbarium B using RDF+XML for the markup ..." - generate example instance documents in the various recommended formats
This works in conjunction with the diagram I recently posted in an email (http://202.27.243.4/tdwg/coremodel.jpg).
Kevin
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John,
If by inertia you include lack of participation, I have to agree with you.
Anyway, I was just trying to understand why you say that it will be a mess to use the fielded text solution for sharing NCD records in the current way the terms are identified. Looking at the DwC fielded text documentation (http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/guides/text/index.htm) I can only see two places that need to reference terms:
1) In the metafile, where each <field> element needs to reference a term by the complete URI. In this case, NCD URIs don't seem to be much longer or uglier than the other ones just because they contain a hash symbol.
Considering the possibility of using NCD terms in DarwinCore, the standard DwC metafile already mixes namespaces because of Dublin Core terms. By the way, I think the example metafile is using wrong identifiers for Dublin Core terms:
http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/examples/text/example_text_simpledwc_complete.xml
2) In the text file header, where people can use any field name assuming there's a metafile, so there's no problem here too. And if there's no metafile, the specification says that the text file could still be understood if the header references "Darwin Core terms". From the example, I think this means using the term name (i.e., a local identifier). I would suggest being more explicit in the specification saying "Darwin Core term names" and adding a Dublin Core term in the example to make it more complete.
Considering the possibility of using NCD terms in DarwinCore, I guess the corresponding term names would look like ncd:collectionID or ncdterms:collectionID - as defined by DarwinCore.
Anyway, I'm not sure there's enough motivation or broad support from the community to make changes in NCD at this point. Unfortunately not all of its creators are involved in the discussions and I'm aware there are applications already written for NCD (such as the Biodiversity Collections Index), so there may be other implications when changing it. Please take my original suggestion as just an attempt to make these two TDWG standards complement each other. I'll still be happy with the original design for the collection* and institution* DarwinCore elements.
Best Regards, -- Renato
I'm moving this conversation into tdwg-content to weave together the conversation for all.
Sorry about the confusion. The conversation has progressed in this side thread beyond my proposal in the tdwg-content list.
I'm not sure what you mean by shield, but yes, the idea is to make sure they are minimally affected by whatever may happen to NCD. To me that means using a refinement, technically.
Yes, at least from the process perspective there is still an opportunity to rework NCD, as it hasn't fully progressed through the standards process. It is now at essentially the same stage as Darwin Core, though I expect Darwin Core to be ready for Executive Review this week, while NCD may take longer.
I agree that consistent conventions would be nice across standards. Ultimately it will help all of our stakeholders. But DwC is the first to follow the vocabulary-first paradigm in the footsteps of Dublin Core. I can imagine inertia or resistance for other standards in the TDWG family.
On Tue, Sep 15, 2009 at 10:41 AM, renato@cria.org.br wrote:
Hi John,
Initially I had the impression that you repeated the same proposal that you sent to the mailing list, but now I see what you mean. Sorry.
So the idea is to actually shield DwC terms, not exactly refine the NCD ones. I would prefer to see NCD terms being directly used, but I understand your position. Although we have the chance to change NCD, I would feel better knowing Roger's opinion about this. It's a strange situation because in theory we shouldn't be changing NCD. It is already fully ratified (or am I wrong, Wouter?). So we shouldn't expect changes, unless NCD decides to release a new version and go through the TDWG process all over again.
I definitely agree that we should try to define and use the same namespace and naming conventions across our standards. -- Renato
I think my solution is already congruent with what you are saying, Renato. My proposed solution is to declare these DwC terms as formal refinements of the NCD terms. If the NCD terms change between now and when that standard gets ratified, all DwC will have to do is change the refines attributes - no one in implementation will be affected. That aside, I think it would be best if NCD followed the established DC pattern of term identification, not just for consistency, but also for usability. I can definitely foresee people wanting to use the fielded text solution for sharing NCD records, and the way the terms are identified now that will be a mess.
Here are the terms I have proposed and their formal refinements.
dwc:institutionCode refines http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/terms/Institution#Code dwc:institutionID refines http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/terms/Institution#Id dwc:collectionCode refines http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/terms/Collection#Code dwc:collectionID refines http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/terms/Collection#Id dwc:ownerInstitutionCode refines http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/terms/Institution#Code
Comments inline.
On Wed, Sep 16, 2009 at 6:47 AM, renato@cria.org.br wrote:
John,
If by inertia you include lack of participation, I have to agree with you.
Well, I wasn't thinking of it exactly that way, it is just that, having been at this standards development for DwC for 11 contiguous months, I know it isn't easy.
Anyway, I was just trying to understand why you say that it will be a mess to use the fielded text solution for sharing NCD records in the current way the terms are identified. Looking at the DwC fielded text documentation (http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/guides/text/index.htm) I can only see two places that need to reference terms:
- In the metafile, where each <field> element needs to reference a term
by the complete URI. In this case, NCD URIs don't seem to be much longer or uglier than the other ones just because they contain a hash symbol.
Considering the possibility of using NCD terms in DarwinCore, the standard DwC metafile already mixes namespaces because of Dublin Core terms. By the way, I think the example metafile is using wrong identifiers for Dublin Core terms:
http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/examples/text/example_text_simpledwc_complete.xml
- In the text file header, where people can use any field name assuming
there's a metafile, so there's no problem here too. And if there's no metafile, the specification says that the text file could still be understood if the header references "Darwin Core terms". From the example, I think this means using the term name (i.e., a local identifier). I would suggest being more explicit in the specification saying "Darwin Core term names" and adding a Dublin Core term in the example to make it more complete.
You are absolutely right. I was actually just thinking of the Simple Darwin Core text files with no meta file. Your clarification suggestions are good. I have implemented them for the next version.
Considering the possibility of using NCD terms in DarwinCore, I guess the corresponding term names would look like ncd:collectionID or ncdterms:collectionID - as defined by DarwinCore.
Anyway, I'm not sure there's enough motivation or broad support from the community to make changes in NCD at this point. Unfortunately not all of its creators are involved in the discussions and I'm aware there are applications already written for NCD (such as the Biodiversity Collections Index), so there may be other implications when changing it. Please take my original suggestion as just an attempt to make these two TDWG standards complement each other. I'll still be happy with the original design for the collection* and institution* DarwinCore elements.
Thanks for your thoughtful suggestions and understanding.
John
Best Regards,
Renato
I'm moving this conversation into tdwg-content to weave together the conversation for all.
Sorry about the confusion. The conversation has progressed in this side thread beyond my proposal in the tdwg-content list.
I'm not sure what you mean by shield, but yes, the idea is to make sure they are minimally affected by whatever may happen to NCD. To me that means using a refinement, technically.
Yes, at least from the process perspective there is still an opportunity to rework NCD, as it hasn't fully progressed through the standards process. It is now at essentially the same stage as Darwin Core, though I expect Darwin Core to be ready for Executive Review this week, while NCD may take longer.
I agree that consistent conventions would be nice across standards. Ultimately it will help all of our stakeholders. But DwC is the first to follow the vocabulary-first paradigm in the footsteps of Dublin Core. I can imagine inertia or resistance for other standards in the TDWG family.
On Tue, Sep 15, 2009 at 10:41 AM, renato@cria.org.br wrote:
Hi John,
Initially I had the impression that you repeated the same proposal that you sent to the mailing list, but now I see what you mean. Sorry.
So the idea is to actually shield DwC terms, not exactly refine the NCD ones. I would prefer to see NCD terms being directly used, but I understand your position. Although we have the chance to change NCD, I would feel better knowing Roger's opinion about this. It's a strange situation because in theory we shouldn't be changing NCD. It is already fully ratified (or am I wrong, Wouter?). So we shouldn't expect changes, unless NCD decides to release a new version and go through the TDWG process all over again.
I definitely agree that we should try to define and use the same namespace and naming conventions across our standards. -- Renato
I think my solution is already congruent with what you are saying, Renato. My proposed solution is to declare these DwC terms as formal refinements of the NCD terms. If the NCD terms change between now and when that standard gets ratified, all DwC will have to do is change the refines attributes - no one in implementation will be affected. That aside, I think it would be best if NCD followed the established DC pattern of term identification, not just for consistency, but also for usability. I can definitely foresee people wanting to use the fielded text solution for sharing NCD records, and the way the terms are identified now that will be a mess.
Here are the terms I have proposed and their formal refinements.
dwc:institutionCode refines http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/terms/Institution#Code dwc:institutionID refines http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/terms/Institution#Id dwc:collectionCode refines http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/terms/Collection#Code dwc:collectionID refines http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/terms/Collection#Id dwc:ownerInstitutionCode refines http://rs.tdwg.org/ncd/terms/Institution#Code
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participants (4)
-
Blum, Stan -
John R. WIECZOREK -
Kevin Richards -
renato＠cria.org.br