[tdwg-tapir] Mapping to CNS file

[Renato De Giovanni]

Hi Roger,

Can you give an example of the URI using a fragment identifier for a 
concept source? Are you thinking about something like this: 

http://somehost/somepath?cs=darwincore1.4

It will probably be the simplest solution now. 
The configuration interface (and the CNS handler) can be changed 
later to support URIs that don't specify a conceptual schema.

Best Regards,
--
Renato

On 22 Mar 2007 at 14:23, Roger Hyam wrote:
> 
> I am trying to get my head round this and figure out if it matters or  
> not.
> 
> When some one is running a configurator on a wrapper they need to  
> pick sets of concepts (concept_source) that they will map for a  
> particular endpoint.
> 
> The configurator needs to get these sets of concepts from somewhere  
> that is managed centrally for any one thematic network so that it can  
> be kept up to date.
> 
> The configurator will probably know about some sets of concepts when  
> it is installed but the user needs to be able to specify other sets.
> 
> In the case of the set of concepts being contained in an XML Schema  
> there is a 1:1 relationship between the set and a URI.
> 
> In the case of the set of concepts being contained in a CNS file (as  
> currently specified) there is potentially a one to many relationship  
> where the URI may refer to many sets of concepts in a single file  
> unless we adopt a convention of using a fragment identifier in the  
> URI to specify a particular concept_source within the CNS.
> 
> The advantage to having multiple concept_sources in a single CNS is  
> that the wrapper can be distributed with the URI of a CNS that can  
> subsequently contain new concept_sources that weren't known about  
> previously.
> 
> I suspect that (although it would be good to have a system where the  
> configurators lead people through choosing which concept_sources they  
> might want to map things against) it is actually much easier just to  
> have a web page that describes them and gives the URI to enter into  
> the configurator.
> 
> My preference at the moment is to adopt the convention of using the  
> fragment identifier to point out which concept_source within a CNS is  
> used. The URI fragment == alias of the concept_source. This keeps the  
> 1:1 mapping of URI to concept_source and the implementation simple.  
> The wrapper can simply not support CNS mapping where the fragment  
> isn't specified or it can load the whole CNS and ask the user to pick  
> which concept_source they want to use.
> 
> A possibility for the TAPIRLink implemenation is to have the  
> schemas.xml file loaded from a central location.
> 
>  From the ontology point of view it makes sense to have a URI for  
> each main object types that returns the CNS for that view onto the  
> ontology - so I guess that is the reason I did it that way. I could  
> always put together a uri that returned a concatenation of the CNS  
> files for all the different entry points for the ontology if that was  
> useful.
> 
> What do you think?
> 
> Roger