[topicmapmail] Stupid question---thanks

[Daniel Rivers-Moore]

Eliot

I'm puzzled as to why you suggest that the notes in Suellen's example
should be held *outside* the topic map. I can certainly see that your
example shows a way in which a topic map and information about it can be
held together in a well-formed XML document  that uses an XTM namespace
for those parts of it that constitute the topic map itself. But what is
the benefit of excluding the informative notes from the topic map and
therefore preventing a Topic Map processor from being used to gain value
from them? Sure, they are "meta" information, but one of the beauties of
the topic maps paradigm, in my view, is that because of its graph-like
structure it is not tied to a single hierarchy and so there is no need
to have a strict segregation of "meta" levels. After all, one man's meta
is another man's passion ;-).

Kind regards,

Daniel Rivers-Moore
Content Development Director
RivCom Ltd

t: +44 (0)1793 792004
f: +44 (0)1793 792001
e: daniel.rivers-moore@rivcom.com
<mailto:daniel.rivers-moore@rivcom.com>=20
w: www.rivcom.com

 =20
________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________

This e-mail and any attachments may contain confidential and/or
privileged material; it is for the intended addressee(s) only. If you
are not a named addressee, you must not use, retain or disclose such
information. RivCom Ltd cannot guarantee that the e-mail or any
attachments are free from viruses.


=20

-----Original Message-----
From: W. Eliot Kimber [mailto:eliot@isogen.com]
Sent: 02 September 2002 14:57
To: topicmapmail@infoloom.com
Subject: Re: [topicmapmail] Stupid question---thanks


Jan Algermissen wrote:
>=20
> Suellen Stringer-Hye wrote:

 [...]

> > </topicMap>
> >
> > A couple of notes on the above:
>=20
> ..you might want to include your notes in the map as
> resourceData elements, such as
>=20
> <topic id=3D"record">
>    <baseName>
>      <baseNameString>Record</baseNameString>
>    </baseName>
>     <occurrence>
>       <instanceOf>
>         <topicRef xlink:href=3D"#note" />
>       </instanceOf>
>       <resourceData>
>        The records in the database are pointers to web resources
>        maintained internationally
>       </resourceData>
>    </occurrence>
> </topic>

I'm not sure this is, rhetorically, a good use of occurrence--that is,
in what sense is this (semantic) comment an occurrence of the topic
"record"? I would either maintain this information outside the scope of
the topic map or associate it using a "annotation" association w/in the
topic map. But my initial instinct is that this type of note is not part
of the topic map itself (not part of the "knowledge" represented by the
topic map) but is a metacomment about the topic map, and therefore
should not itself be part of the topic map.=20

Because topicMap elements need not be the root elements of the documents
that contain them, it is easy to have a single document instance that
has both XTM elements and (outside the scope of any topicMap elements),
other elements. This can be used both to avoid restrictions on
resourceData and do additional application-specific stuff (such as
annotating topic map constructions w/o using topic map constructs). For
example, you might do this:

<?xml version=3D"1.0"?>
<myTopicmapCollection=20
  xmlns:xtm=3D"http://topicmaps.org/...."
  xmlns:xhtm=3D"http://w3.org/TR/xhtml....">
<!-- here you could have all sorts of metadata that describes this
document in a way
     that you cannot annotate a bare topicMap document. -->
  <docMetaData>
    <author>W. Eliot Kimber, eliot@isogen.com</author>
    <copyright>...</copyright>
    <date.created>2002-09-02</date.created>
  </docMetaData>
  <topicMaps>
    <xtm:topicMap>
      <xtm:topic id=3D"topic-01">
       <xtm:occurrence>
         <xtm:resourceRef =
xlink:href=3D"xpointer(//*[@id=3D'desc-01'])"/>
       </xtm:occurrence>
      </xtm:topic>
    </xtm:topicMap>
  </topicMaps>
  <topicDescriptions>
    <description id=3D"desc-01">
      <xhtm:p>This is the description of topic 'topic-01'</xhtm:p>
      <xhtm:p>This is the second paragraph of the description, something
you can't
do in resourceData.</xhtm:p>
    </description>  =20
  </topicDescriptions>
  <topicNotes>
    <note xlink:href=3D"xpointer(//*[@id=3D'topic-01'])">
     <xhtm:p>The records in the database are pointers to web resources
maintained internationally</xhtm:p>
    </note>
  </topicNotes>
</myTopicMapCollection>

Note that any XTM processor that cannot correctly handle this document
(as far as finding the topicMap and ignoring the rest goes) cannot claim
to be a conforming XTM processor.

[Metacomment: why am I not using bare names in my hrefs? Because without
a DTD the pointers should *FAIL* to be resolved because bare pointers in
XPointers are equivalent to "id()", which only works if there's a DTD.
There is no DTD for this document. Therefore I must use the full
XPointer syntax.]

Cheers,

Eliot
--=20
W. Eliot Kimber, eliot@isogen.com
Consultant, ISOGEN International

1016 La Posada Dr., Suite 240
Austin, TX  78752 Phone: 512.656.4139
_______________________________________________
topicmapmail mailing list
topicmapmail@infoloom.com
http://www.infoloom.com/mailman/listinfo/topicmapmail