[Date Prev] | [Thread Prev] | [Thread Next] | [Date Next] -- [Date Index] | [Thread Index] | [Elist Home]
Subject: [xtm-wg] draft incomplete minutes of Dallas meeting
We thought it best to get this information out immediately, although
it may not be perfect. Let us know if there are problems.
Scroll down. It's just text.
-Steve
--
Steven R. Newcomb, Consultant
srn@coolheads.com
voice: +1 972 359 8160
fax: +1 972 359 0270
405 Flagler Court
Allen, Texas 75013-2821 USA
*****************************************************************
-- INCOMPLETE DRAFT dated November 14, 2000 -
Minutes of Topicmaps.Org Authoring Group (AG) Meeting of
November 10-12, 2000, nominally 9:00-18:00 daily, in Dallas,
Texas
Host: Epremis Corporation and Isogen/DataChannel
Dallas, Texas, United States of America
Location: Radisson Hotel, 6060 North Central Expressway.
Most of the meeting time was spent finalizing the
specification (XTM v.1.0) that is going to be delivered on
Dec. 5 at the XTM Special Interest Day at the XML 2000
Conference, in Washington, DC.
During the two first days, the Conceptual Model and
Interchange Syntax subgroups broke out in separate
sessions. The last day was a plenary, where it was decided
that the two subgroups had accomplished their tasks, and
that what remained to be done was the integration and
harmonization of the two models into the XTM 1.0 Spec.
Present at the meeting were:
Murray Altheim
Michel Biezunski
Eric Freese
Sam Hunting
Andrius Kulikauskas
Luis Martinez
Peter Newcomb (Invited Guest)
Steven R. Newcomb
Nikita Ogievietsky
Jack Park
Steve Pepper
Daniel Rivers-Moore
After educating itself as to both the proposed syntax model
and the proposed conceptual model, and after due
consideration of and adjustments to both models, the
Topicmaps.org Authoring Group gave its go-ahead for
publication of the XTM 1.0 Specification on December 5,
2000.
To that end, it authorized certain persons to accomplish the
following tasks on its behalf:
The XTM 1.0 Specification will be delivered on December 5,
2000. All Participating Members and Invited Guests are
invited to contribute their work and comments to the
appropriate "Recipient of Raw Material" identified below, if
any. N.B.: Because of extreme time pressure, no replies
should be expected for unsolicited material. The editorial
and other decisions made by the designated responsible
persons, and by the editors, are final, and there is no
guarantee that comments will have any effect on the XTM 1.0
Specification.
1.0. At minimum, the XTM 1.0 Specification will include the
following items, and it will not be published without
them:
1.1. An Interchange Syntax, expressed as an XML DTD.
Murray Altheim will be the recipient of raw
materials. The responsible parties are Murray
Altheim, Michel Biezunski, Sam Hunting, and
Steve Newcomb.
1.2. A "Conformance Clause" that will establish what
constitutes conformance to the XTM 1.0
Specification.
Steve Newcomb will be the recipient of raw
materials for this section. The responsible
parties are Sam Hunting and Steve Newcomb.
1.3. A set of "published topics", expressed as a
topic map that contains topics whose subject
descriptors describe the published topics.
Several of the subject descriptors will be other
portions of the XTM 1.0 Specification. Other
subject descriptors will be contained within the
map itself, including all those that are
intended to act as association templates (these
are themselves expressed as associations).
These published topics are the conceptual
pillars of the XTM 1.0 Specification itself.
Daniel Rivers-Moore will be the recipient of raw
materials for this section. The responsible
parties are Murray Altheim and Daniel
Rivers-Moore.
2.0. If the following items become available in time for
due editorial process before the rollout date, they
will be included:
2.1. Prose explaining each and every construct in the
DTD.
Steve Pepper will be the recipient of raw
materials for this section. The responsible
parties are Murray Altheim, Sam Hunting, and
Steve Pepper.
2.2. An annex that explains the conceptual model of
XTM topic maps.
Daniel Rivers-Moore will be the recipient of raw
materials for this section. The responsible
parties are Graham Moore (who has not yet
confirmed this commitment as of this writing) and
Daniel Rivers-Moore.
2.3. An annex that explains the processing model
whereby an interchangeable XTM instance is
converted into a graph representation that is
consistent with the XTM Conceptual Model. This
Annex will discuss, reification rules, merging
rules, the namespaces within which topics have
their names, etc.: How to interpret the syntax in
a procedural fashion so that it maps to the
conceptual model.
Steve Newcomb will be the recipient of raw
material for this section. The responsible
parties are Michel Biezunski, Sam Hunting, and
Steve Newcomb.
2.4. An annex that consists primarily of an XSLT
script that can transform topic map documents
that conform to the ISO/IEC 13250:2000 DTD into
XTM 1.0 Specification-conforming instances.
Nikita Ogievetsky will be the responsible party
and recipient of raw material for this section.
2.5. A brief general introduction to the XTM
Specification.
Jack Park will be the recipient of raw material
for this section. The responsible parties are
Sam Hunting, Jack Park, and Steve Pepper.
3.0. The following items, while extremely important, will
not form part of the XTM 1.0 Specification. They will
be published separately when they become available.
3.1. Examples of use. Use cases.
3.2. Procedures for conformance testing.
4.0. The following anticipated future enhancements to the
XTM 1.0 Specification are known to be important and
are expected to receive considerable attention from
the AG in the coming months.
4.1. Topic map templates
4.2. Topic map query language
4.3. Enhanced interchange/interdependency between XTM
and RDF.
The following procedural rules for the remainder of the
production process were adopted:
- Every temporary version (work in progress) must be sent
immediately to the egroups list. It should also be
addressed to the appropriate "raw material recipient", if
any, as shown above.
- All persons in Topicmaps.org, including all advisory
members (and including, therefore, all the people who lurk
on the e-groups list) are free to comment. All commenters
are urgently requested to mention the CVS revision number
the resource on which they are commenting. Disclaimer:
Most comments are unlikely to be answered. The
responsible parties do not commit themselves to answer,
take into account, or even read the comments.
- Every version will be made available to everybody on the
Web. Therefore, no intermediary version should include
any inappropriate comments.
- CVS will be used (by Murray Altheim) for revision
tracking. All revisions will be available for
downloading. Murray will do the check-ins and check-outs;
Murray is the interface to this repository.
- Murray Altheim urgently requests everyone to submit raw
materials as follows:
- Art (diagrams, etc.) in JPEG.
- Text as plain text with extra white space between
paragraphs, and with a '#' character at the beginning of
each heading.
The following editorial policies for XTM 1.0 were
promulgated by Sam Hunting and they represent the consensus
of the AG. Several of these policies are responsive to the
requirement that the XTM 1.0 Specification must be perceived
as being simple and light.
- The XTM specification shall be
* Standalone
* W3C-REC-like
* Example-filled
* Short
* Clear
* Designed to be available in print
and on line
- In detail:
* Standalone:
- No other specfications needed for understanding
(XML, XLink)
* W3C-REC-like[1] in prose and presentation style:
- Comprehension level
- Use of "shall", "must", etc
- Other typical locutions
- Formatting
- But with some visual distinction from W3C
o Logo, color, 2-way links?
- And consistent in all the above-listed characteristics
throughout.
* Example-filled:
- Using a complete topic map used piece-wise
through text that:
o Exercises all key concepts
o Contains subject matter of interest to the
web community[2]
* Short:
- A maximum of 20 pages[3]
o Not including Annexes
- Annexes will be kept to a minimum, ideally 4,
including:
o XTM DTD
o Example topic map
o List of predeclared PSIs[4]
o UML diagrams[5]
o Processing model
- Other supplementary monographs may be
referenced from the spec to minimize
the Annex count.
o XSLT stylesheet for transforming
ISO to XTM.
o Instances addressed by PDs
* Clear
- Where possible, complex relations shall be expressed
in summary form:
o Lists
o Tables ("cheat sheets")
o Diagrams
* Designed to be available online and in print.
Notes
-----
[1] The model for a good W3C spec is XML 1.0.
[2] Not, unfortunately, opera.
[3] Previewed in an editor's browser with text set to
"smaller."
[4] Possibly a topic map, including PDs (and archetypical
associations?)
[5] Probably in an Annex.
************************************************************************
A forthcoming draft will include other details about the Dallas meeting.
************************************************************************
-------------------------- eGroups Sponsor -------------------------~-~>
eLerts
It's Easy. It's Fun. Best of All, it's Free!
http://click.egroups.com/1/9699/1/_/337252/_/974265532/
---------------------------------------------------------------------_->
To Post a message, send it to: xtm-wg@eGroups.com
To Unsubscribe, send a blank message to: xtm-wg-unsubscribe@eGroups.com
[Date Prev] | [Thread Prev] | [Thread Next] | [Date Next] -- [Date Index] | [Thread Index] | [Elist Home]
Powered by eList eXpress LLC