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Subject: [announce] OASIS Expands Topic Maps Development


OASIS Expands Topic Maps Development

Consortium Members Form New Technical Committees to Define Published
Subjects for XML Standards and Geography and Languages

Boston, MA, USA; 13 February 2002 -- OASIS, the XML interoperability
consortium, today announced its members have formed two new technical
committees to advance the XML Topic Maps specification (ISO/IEC
13250:2000) for organizing, retrieving and navigating information
resources. The OASIS Vocabulary for XML Standards and Technologies
(XMLvoc) Technical Committee will define the essential subjects needed
to create interchangeable ontologies for the XML domain. The OASIS
Published Subjects for Geography and Languages (GeoLang) Technical
Committee will define sets of published subjects for languages,
countries, and regions.

Both new technical committees will advance the topic maps model, which
provides a ‘knowledge layer’--independent of the information resources
themselves--to capture and manage corporate memory, improve indexing and
enable the integration of information that spans multiple, disparate
repositories. Applications include subject classification, search and
retrieval tools, portals, semantic Web, and knowledge management.

According to Debra Logan, senior research analyst at Gartner, "Any
enterprise that has invested time and effort in searching for
information resources online and needs a way to capture the output of
that search will have a use for topic maps. Because the paradigm is
powerful, flexible and extensible, topic maps will become a mainstream
technology by 2003."

"XMLvoc will provide a reference set of concept and relationship types
that will enable common access layers, making it easier to locate all
types of information on XML," explained Dr. H. Holger Rath of empolis,
chair of the OASIS XMLvoc Technical Committee. "Our work will allow
information providers all over the world to create XML-related topics
maps that can be merged and interoperate with one another. XMLvoc also
will make it possible to collaboratively develop overarching indexes
that improve accessibility to all aspects of XML, its related
specifications, the communities that use it, the tools that support it,
and the companies that provide services and expertise around it."

Lars Marius Garshol, chair of the OASIS GeoLang Technical Committee,
observed, "Languages, countries, and regions are subjects that occur
frequently across a wide range of topic maps. GeoLang's published
subjects will establish the foundation for internationalization of topic
maps, and ensure that topic maps referring to these key subjects will
merge correctly. Our group will update and extend existing topic maps
work using code sets defined by recognized standards bodies such as ISO
and the United Nations."

Users around the world welcome these development efforts at OASIS.
"Topic maps will become an essential part of the added value that
commercial publishers apply to their content," says Ton Schoonderbeek,
CTO of Wolters Kluwer - Law, Tax and Business Europe. "Standardized
subjects from the various application domains will ensure the return on
our investments for topic maps. We greatly appreciate the topic map
initiatives for vertical markets."

Members of the new OASIS Topic Maps Technical Committees include
consortium sponsors, empolis, Innodata, Reuters, and other OASIS
members. Participation remains open to all organizations and individuals
interested in advancing the topic maps navigation model. Information on
joining OASIS can be found on http://www.oasis-open.org/join.

OASIS will host open mail lists for public comment on XMLvoc and
GeoLang, and completed work will be freely available to the public
without licensing or other fees.

"I am looking forward to the outcome of the XMLvoc TC that will result
in ontologies becoming interchangeable and robust. These groundbreaking
developments are especially important for ontologies in the IT domain of
XML standards and technologies," stated Dr. Stefan Wess, empolis CTO.
Dr. H. Holger Rath, empolis Director of R&D and chair of the XMLvoc TC
added, "The results of the TC will be a significant step towards global
knowledge interchange."



About OASIS
OASIS (www.oasis-open.org), a not-for-profit, global consortium, drives
the development, convergence and adoption of e-business standards.
Members themselves set the OASIS technical agenda, using a lightweight,
open process expressly designed to promote industry consensus and unite
disparate efforts. OASIS is the home for XML conformance, Web services,
security, business transactions, electronic publishing, topic maps and
other interoperability specifications development.

OASIS has more than 400 corporate and individual members in 100
countries around the world. OASIS and the United Nations jointly sponsor
ebXML, a global framework for e-business data exchange. OASIS operates
XML.org, a community clearinghouse for XML application schemas,
vocabularies and related documents. OASIS also hosts The XML Cover
Pages, an online reference collection for interoperable markup language
standards.


For more information:
Carol Geyer
Director of Communications
OASIS
carol.geyer@oasis-open.org
+1.978.667.5115 x209




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