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Subject: [tm-pubsubj] Vocabulary: will we get rid of "PSI" or not?


Murray, Mary and al.

Mary
> > How about this, or maybe it is too verbose perhaps?
> > "A published subject is any subject for which at least one stable subject
> > definition document or  addressable resource has been made available for
> > public use by the publisher identified within the published subject documentation."
> >
> > We may want to call it published subject documentation package as Lars
> > Marius suggests.

Murray
> I think the text in the XTM 1.0 specification was pretty close. From 2.3.1:
>
>    "A published subject indicator is therefore any resource that has
>     been published in order to provide a positive, unambiguous
>     indication of the identity of a subject for the purpose of
>     facilitating topic map interchange and mergeability."
>
> To be frank (or Frank) I really haven't seen an improvement on that one.

<sigh/> I think we are not yet tuned on the vocabulary. There have been propositions
during and after Orlando meeting, and they are for review in the draft documents on the TC
Web, both for requirements and recommendations. I wish we agree ASAP on the terminology
and stick to it. There is no way to move forward otherwise.

To sum it up and try to clarify, once again:

It was considered in Orlando that "Published Subject Indicator", and worse its
abbreviation PSI, was overloaded, ill-defined and misleading. It was not clear if it was a
resource or the reference of the resource, or both. Moreover, it did not make any
difference between the publisher and the topic map author viewpoint.
That's why the notion was torn to pieces and revisited throughout in Orlando. We finally
decided not to restrict or refine the meaning of PSI, but to let it down altogether. Was
it a good move? I think it was, because we clarified somehow the situation. So, are we
definitely rid of PSIs? Not quite it seems. Let's try to explain once again.

There is vocabulary describing the publisher viewpoint. I capitalize the terminology to
highlight it, it is not capitalized in the TC documents.

1. Published Subject is a subtype of Subject. It is not necessarily addressable, but it is
*documented* in a proper way. But the Published Subject *is not* the documentation about
it.

2. Published Subjects Documentation is providing stable
identification/documentation/definition/description of/about a set of Subjects, therefore
becoming Published Subjects - if they were not yet : the same Subject can be documented by
different publishers in different Published Subjects Documentations.

3. The part of a Published Subjects Documentation providing
identification/documentation/definition/description of/about *one* Subject is a Subject
Definition Document, or better, following recent proposition, *Subject Definition
Resource*, since it can be only a document node.

Now we have the viewpoint of the Topic Map author, who may use whatever resource he wants
to indicate a subject identity.

4. Subject Indicator is a resource used by a Topic Map author to identify a subject.
Hopefully, it is a Subject Definition Resource (in a relevant Published Subjects
Documentation). At least that is the best practice to recommend to topic maps authors. But
it cannot be made mandatory or inforced, because some times the author won't find any
available Subject Definition Resource, and will pick whatever she'll find, hoping the
resource chosen is stable both in address and content. And hoping it fits really the need.
Declaring Subject Indicator is in the full responsibility of the TM author. It does not
involve the Subject Indicator publisher, not even aware of it. If the TM breaks because
this Subject Indicator is not trustable, it's not the responsibility of the publisher of
the resource, who certainly never declared it was trustable, nor even intended to define
any subject with it. And there is no way for the topic map author to make *any* resource a
(proper) Subject Definition Resource just by pointing at it, saying "Hey, don't you move
anymore, I've PSI-ed you".

5. Subject Indicator Reference is the URI used in <subjectIndicatorRef>. This is purely
technical, and it's completely again the TM author viewpoint.

In that context "Published Subject Indicator" could still be used in a consistent way, in
the (recommended) situation where the TM author has indeed be wise enough to use as
Subject Indicator a conformant Subject Definition Resource. Therefore I would propose, if
you like, to keep "PSI" but with the following definition, pointing at a full agreement,
trust and tuning between a Subject Documentation Publisher and a TM Author.

"A Published Subject Indicator is a Subject Definition Resource used as a Subject
Indicator"

If we don't get over with that one, I surrender ...

Bottom line: I guess the XTM editors did not make this distinguo, either because they
focused more on the TM author viewpoint than on the publisher's, or because they were
already projecting themselves in the realm of a "Web of Intelligence and Trust" where this
distinction would be obsolete because of such an abundancy of Subject Definition Resources
that chosing something else for Subject Indicator would be silly - and moreover there
would not be silly TM authors any more.

Bernard

-------------------------------------------------
Bernard Vatant - Consultant
Mondeca - "Making Sense of Content"
www.mondeca.com
bernard.vatant@mondeca.com
-------------------------------------------------



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