[topicmapmail] Anyone looked seriously at XFML?

[Murray Altheim]

It seems most extensions to TMs involve domain-specific or
application-specific features that *could* be implemented
as topics or associations within TMs, though often with
more cumbersome syntax. One trades off interoperability
for proprietary features understandable to a very limited
scope of applications, usually just a single one. Given
the tenor of conversations in the past month or so, people
are seemingly willing to give up interoperability in their
applications and documents to gain things like MIME typing.
This is understandable given project requirements, but a
bit regrettable -- we'd hoped things like <variant> would
provide some sort of extensibility but obviously the scope
of potential mods to XTM is enormous, and simplicity rather
than kitchen sink was the approach.

With XFML they've gone to the trouble of developing a domain-
specific syntax that uses some of the core concepts of TMs,
basing the semantics on a mix of TMs and faceted classification.

I'm wondering if anyone has done any sort of in-depth analysis
of XFML, available at:

    XFML home page
    http://www.xfml.org/

    XFML 1.0 Core - eXchangeable Faceted Metadata Language
    http://www.xfml.org/spec/1.0.html

I'm specifically curious if XFML really provides anything that
XTM couldn't with some PSIs provide. I've been looking into
faceted classification schemes for the last year or so and would
rather use an existing technology within my application than use
something both new and different, if possible. If I don't use
XFML I'll likely develop a faceted classification/grounded theory
schema of PSIs for use in my existing XTM/visualization code.

Thanks for any info,

Murray

......................................................................
Murray Altheim                  <http://kmi.open.ac.uk/people/murray/>
Knowledge Media Institute
The Open University, Milton Keynes, Bucks, MK7 6AA, UK

      In the evening
      The rice leaves in the garden
      Rustle in the autumn wind
      That blows through my reed hut.  -- Minamoto no Tsunenobu