Re: [regrep] Re: [ebxml-cppa] CPP identification revisited

[Christopher Ferris <chris.ferris@sun.com>]

Nita,

(please repost to reg/rep list... I'm not subscribed)

These UID identifiers, while recognizable by "those in the know"
aren't in any way guaranteed to be unique. This issue has been
hashed over ad nauseum in the CPP/A and MSG lists with regards
to identifiers for parties such as DUNS numbers (Duane's Unique
Numbering Scheme:)

While I certainly agree that the UUID's assigned by a registry
are opaque and indecipherable by mere mortals, what you seem
to be asking for is not a unique identifier, but a human understandable
description. Note that from where I sit, "OAG090200" means as little
to me as "WERTRET-4523-RYJYJRYK-32436-GJDJFJDFJDFHDF"! They are merely
a collection of ascii characters.

<a 
href="http://example.com/regrep/resolve/WERTRET-4523-RYJYJRYK-32436-GJDJFJDFJDFHDF">OAG 
Quote To Collect Business Process for the Auto Industry</a> on the other 
hand provides me with something I can grok without having to be a OAG BP 
geek, as well as something my computer can grok with relative ease such 
that it can
retrieve the process document referenced should I be interested.

What concerns me is that we aren't leveraging the web the way it
was meant to serve us.

Neither "OAG090200" nor "WERTRET-4523-RYJYJRYK-32436-GJDJFJDFJDFHDF" are
useful on their own without some further information or context.
Neither provide me with enough information that I might be able to
actually understand what is identified beyond a potentially unique
string of bytes.

I might suggest that none of this is new. The whole semantic web
initiative is addressing this space. URI's are meant to be opaque
to mere mortals. RDF attempts to provide for the ability to
describe what these URI's reference in an extensible manner. Other 
examples of use of web technologies to address this include RDDL (W3C 
note) and XLink.

IMO, we're treading on well trodden ground.

Cheers,

Chris

Sharma, Nita wrote:

> Hi David,
> 
> Thanks for clarifying what I meant. I definitely was not referring to the
> internal UUID mechanism of reg/rep but asking for support for external UIDs
> as well for whatever purpose as specified by the user community for unique
> identification of BP.
> 
> Cheers
> 
> - Nita
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: David RR Webber - XMLGlobal [mailto:Gnosis_@compuserve.com]
> Sent: Monday, February 11, 2002 3:29 PM
> To: Duane Nickull
> Cc: Sharma, Nita; 'regrep@lists.oasis-open.org';
> ebxml-cppa@lists.oasis-open.org; Martin W Sachs; 'Nikola Stojanovic'
> Subject: [regrep] Re: [ebxml-cppa] CPP identification revisited
> 
> 
> Message text written by Duane Nickull
> 
>>Nita:
>>
> 
> "Meaningful" is not a requirement for the UID.  The UID is to be
> interpretted by applications.  We have other  ways to convey
> semantically meaningful element identifiers such as the Element names in
> XML.  The only requirement for a UUID is that is is globally, uniquely
> identifiable.   
> <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
> 
> I believe there is confusing creeping in here again.
> 
> The UUID that the Registry spec's references is the mechanism
> that Microsoft uses to calculate registry keys in Windows 95/98/2000 and
> NT.
> 
> If you search the Microsoft web site you will find this reference.  The 
> mechanism is an algorithm based on some ISO standard.  It creates
> a random 128 byte string that is guaranteed to be unique.
> 
> Clearly 128 byte random strings are NOT verifiable by humans.
> 
> If I tell you I am using WERTRET-4523-RYJYJRYK-32436-GJDJFJDFJDFHDF
> instead of WERTRYYE-3245-SDGDG-123-SDFGSDGSFDHH in my
> purchase order - you have no way of knowing if this is good or bad.
> 
> However - if I tell you I'm using element OAG090101 instead of OAG090200
> then
> this is something you can verify.
> 
> The Registry allows for the use of an EXTERNAL ID - to identify items - and
> this is where you can store the UID value (alpha uppercase prefix, six
> digit numeric)
> to provide a human processable key value.
> 
> These UID values can be arbitarily allocated - i.e start from 001000 and
> number
> sequentially - or may re-use existing numbering - such as X12 or EDIFACT 
> element numbers - i.e. X12EDI000201  or a system such as UDEF labels.
> 
> Recap' on this - UUID - internal foriegn key value for use within Registry
> systems.
> 
> UID - external key value system for use with ebXML to uniquely identify
> content
> artifact - examples - CPP, CPA, BPSS, CCR, and so on.
> 
> Thanks, DW.
> 
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