OASIS Mailing List ArchivesView the OASIS mailing list archive below
or browse/search using MarkMail.

 


Help: OASIS Mailing Lists Help | MarkMail Help

soa-rm-ra message

[Date Prev] | [Thread Prev] | [Thread Next] | [Date Next] -- [Date Index] | [Thread Index] | [List Home]


Subject: Re: [soa-rm-ra] Finalised definitions list and comparison table


Rex,
as you can see, I do not have Actor of my list of "over-defined" terms. 

I have mentioned Actor as a part of two definition loops but it does not mean that the definition of Actor is incorrect; it is possible that other definitions might require re-wording OR we are fine with all of them! I'd like the Group to decide (the concern is this: if I could find the loop, others will do it (see Murphy's Laws), i.e. we have to know what to say in such cases)

- Michael



-----Original Message-----
From: Rex Brooks <rex.brooks@ncoic.org>
To: mpoulin@usa.com
Cc: soa-rm-ra@lists.oasis-open.org
Sent: Tue, Feb 1, 2011 1:06 am
Subject: Re: [soa-rm-ra] Finalised definitions list and comparison table

The Ontology Summit is just a curious coincidence, and that particular audience is not one of the constituencies I was referring to, which would be the DoDAF Metamodel group and the NCOIC Services WG and other Emergency Management oriented groups. I'll have to give Actor another look, though unless there's an overriding purpose I will stay with 7/28/10 version until convinced otherwise. Since I wasn't having the problem with it that others have expressed, I would really like to hear an exceptional overriding purpose or concern. I understand that the group judgement rules. I'm just saying what I think, but I will look at it again when/if I can between now and Wednesday's meeting.

Cheers,
Rex

On 1/31/11 10:44 AM, mpoulin@usa.com wrote:
@ Peter
for the point 1 - I do exactly as you said in my diagrams; there is not problem at all

With regard to point 2, I'd prefer to deal with the composite definition as the whole one, without splitting them into separate words; for example: if the definition of 'Peer Social Structure' does not refer to 'Peer' , I would ignore all relationships with the term 'peer' despite its presence in the name. IN other words, if I do a search against this term, I ignore all cases where words, peer, social, and structure appear separately.

@Rex
I hope that TC addresses the question: should we define all words we use or English is till valid language for expressing our ideas? :-) I can imagine how sticky the Ontology Summit might be but we are writing to not-necessary-ontology-people. If we start define things like  'fact', 'evidence', or 'listener', we risk creating the situation that nobody would talk to us or read the RAF because people loose the confidence in every word they read. In several cases, we re-define terms that have nothing to do with service orientation or architecture.  This is what I am afraid of and talking about.

I have attached an example of the diagram I am drawing where you can see that one basis term is defined while another term references to the first one.

- Michael 

P.S. In the diagram you can see the basis definitions (as immediate children of the element<<Defined the same in both>>: Actor, Participant and Delegate. While I assume there should be some dependencies between these terms, I have not expected two loops of definitions: Actor-Delegate-Actor (marked by red arrows) and   Actor-Participant-Actor (marked by orange arrows). Well, at the end of the day, the purpose of this diagram is exactly this - find discrepancies in the definitions. BTW, you can see elements in the basis definition marked with the version dates and explicit texts of these definitions (sorry, in the given picture these texts are not really readable)

If you want to see the diagram I am drawing, you can use any XML Schema visualisation tool, like Altova's XMLSPY and ask me to send you the Schema's text.


-----Original Message-----
From: Rex Brooks <rex.brooks@ncoic.org>
To: peter@peterfbrown.com
Cc: soa-rm-ra@lists.oasis-open.org
Sent: Mon, Jan 31, 2011 5:03 pm
Subject: Re: [soa-rm-ra] Finalised definitions list and comparison table

For clarity, value is often in the eye of the beholder, and we need to keep in mind that the one thing that I have heard from the constituencies I work with is that they like having definitions because it keeps them grounded. As fates would have it, I'm co-champion of the Values and Metrics Track of this year's Ontology Summit. Very sticky wicket!

Cheers,
Rex

On 1/31/11 7:29 AM, Peter F Brown wrote:
Hi Michael:
1 – I was asked to indicate, for each concept that we define (= term) whether other concepts are used in that definition. For example, the definition of ‘capability’ (whichever one you choose) uses the term ‘RWE’. The objective was to indicate simply dependencies between concepts defined, no more.
2 – I couldn’t agree more but they are listed as per the TC’s request. This needs to be addressed by the editors of the sections concerned.
3 – I agree but others don’t – it is an issue the TC needs to address – Chris and I cut back radically on the number of formally defined concepts precisely for the reasons you invoke. We need to distinguish those concepts that have a particular meaning and value for our work: I would suggest they must meet both criteria (particular meaning AND value) to be considered for inclusion as a formal definition.
 
Regards,
Peter
 
From: mpoulin@usa.com [mailto:mpoulin@usa.com]
Sent: Thursday, 27 January, 2011 01:46
To: soa-rm-ra@lists.oasis-open.org
Subject: Re: [soa-rm-ra] Finalised definitions list and comparison table
 
Hi Peter,
 
 I have 'just' 3 notes:
 
1) I've found only the columns where you specify the line number that refers to the definition in different versions and its occurrences in different places of the document but not "A new column in those sheets with definitions, that indicates the other concepts referred to in the term definition" - it is not obvious that the referred lines belong to other concepts. I would prefer, if you do not mind, having references directly to other definitions in addition to other points in the text
 
2) I've found it is really difficult to deal with composite terms like 'Peer Social Structure' because there are too many potential dependencies separately for 'peer' and 'social structure' that may belong to totally different contexts. For example, reference to the line 2717 leads to 'peer' but 'social structure' is not even mentioned
 
3) in general, I find our extended vocabulary a bit artificial and difficult to operate with: we use relatively common words of plain English in the diagrams and text  AND re-define them in our special definitions. Since the words are common, the reader may not suspect that there is special ontology/semantic is meant in our vocabulary. I am afraid, it is overcomplicated.  Here is one of many examples:
our term Listener is commonly understood as something that listens; one can comprehend this 'something' as a noun - an actor, an object, an entity, a participant, a stakeholder, a system, a human that listens - it is simple and easy; instead, our definition says: "A listener is an actor [OK!] who performs actions [wait a minute, this starts the mixture of concerns!] needed to acquire [where this comes from?] a communication [why is this about a communication only? If an actor listens to acquire not a communication but something else, e.g. RWE, it is not a Listener any more, is it?..]" 
 
For given example, I would not define term Listener at all, it is clearly understood w/o our definition.
 
- Michael
 
 
-----Original Message-----
From: Peter F Brown <peter@peterfbrown.com>
To: soa-rm-ra@lists.oasis-open.org
Sent: Thu, Jan 27, 2011 7:42 am
Subject: [soa-rm-ra] Finalised definitions list and comparison table
Hi:
Chris and I have finished a new version of the definitions table, as requested.
 
The attached version includes:
-          A new sheet indicating where terms are used in Figures – we have “only” (yes, there are more than 150 of them…) included those terms that have not already been listed having a formal definition – we indicate the first occurrence of the term in a diagram as well as (where it is defined) the line number of the definition in the 17 Jan draft
-          A new column in those sheets with definitions, that indicates the other concepts referred to in the term definition
-          The ‘unused’ list is now only terms that are really not used at all, anywhere, in the text but may still appear on a diagram
 
We have not yet included the revised understanding of the concepts of state, shared state, shareable state, joint action, interaction, RWE, execution context – as well as our further understanding of the relationship of those concepts to the SOA ecosystem – I will write up my notes from the offline discussions and circulate those later Thursday.
 
Hope this all helps!
 
Regards,
Peter
 
Peter F Brown
Independent Consultant
Transforming our Relationships with Information Technologies
Web         www.peterfbrown.com
Blog          pensivepeter.wordpress.com
Twitter     @pensivepeter
P.O. Box 49719, Los Angeles, CA 90049, USA
Tel: +1.310.694.2278
 
---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe from this mail list, you must leave the OASIS TC that
generates this mail.  Follow this link to all your TCs in OASIS at:
https://www.oasis-open.org/apps/org/workgroup/portal/my_workgroups.php 
--------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe from this mail list, you must leave the OASIS TC that generates this mail. Follow this link to all your TCs in OASIS at: https://www.oasis-open.org/apps/org/workgroup/portal/my_workgroups.php


[Date Prev] | [Thread Prev] | [Thread Next] | [Date Next] -- [Date Index] | [Thread Index] | [List Home]