Consistency and Formal Model Re: [topicmapmail] Can a resourceRef be a topic

[Dan Brickley]

On Wed, 20 Feb 2002, Bernard Vatant wrote:

> Sam
>
> > [1] "A formal model is needed" does not mean "a formal model is needed
> > that...". *A* formal model does not mean *this* formal model. This or
> > any model must be justified in terms of the topic map paradigm, not the
> > other way round. If it doesn't meet that criterion, another formal
> > model may always be chosen.
>
> I understand your point. But the "terms of the topic map paradigm" will remain fuzzy and
> lead to endless debate until they are expressed in *some* formal model that will anyway
> make some cutting choices on critical issues, if it has to be formally consistent. This
> model must of course be agreed upon by those who legifer on the specification, that is
> ISO/IEC JTC1/SC34. And I completely agree that it could be *any* model, as far as it is
> formal, internally consistent, and agreed upon.

This sounds familiar! We had a similar experience with RDF. The original
specification left some areas open to (seemingly endless) discussion.
Since launching the RDFCore WG we've been working on addressing this
through a Model Theoretic formalisation. I thought folks here might
find this of interest... a new WD recently published at:

http://www.w3.org/TR/rdf-mt/

cheers,

Dan


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