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Subject: Comments on UDDI Taxonomy Representation Requirements


I have not yet seen the REQ-028 document so these comments are based on the
minutes from the FTF and subsequent discussions.

I think we should clearly separate the taxonomy from the UDDI metadata about
the taxonomy.  This will aid in using a standard representation/language to
express the taxonomy, and in using taxonomies that were created without UDDI
in mind.

I think we should use a (subset of a) standard representation/language
rather than inventing our own schema.  This will aid in using tools and
other infrastructure that can be expected around a standard, and in using
taxonomies that were created without UDDI in mind.

I think we should not impose the restriction of a single explicit root.  I
see no reason for this restriction and I think it will require unnecessary
work to use taxonomies with UDDI.  If someone produces an OWL version of
UNSPSC for example then it will probably not have a single root, as UNSPSC
does not, and so we would not be able to use that as the representation of
UNSPSC that was used by/with UDDI.

Leaving aside the question of equivalence, and other requirements relating
to REQ-029, I think the requirements for a representation/language for
simple taxonomies within UDDI are the following:

1) Each node is uniquely identified by a string that can be used as a
keyValue in a keyedReference.

2) Each node can have one or more descriptions associated with it.

3) Each node may have a single parent node.  A node without a parent node is
a root node.  Multiple root nodes are possible.

Note that only the first of these is necessary as far as the UDDI API is
concerned.  The other requirements are to help a GUI to display the taxonomy
as a tree, or set of trees, and to aid the user in choosing the appropriate
value(s).

Do we need to be able to indicate whether a particular node identifier can
be used as a valid keyValue?  I have not come across this idea of valid and
invalid nodes in the general taxonomy literature so this may be a
UDDI-specific thing.

Turning to the question of the UDDI metadata about a taxonomy, I don't see
anything about that in the FTF minutes, but looking at Luc's example, and
the various proprietary schemes that have been developed, the metadata about
a taxonomy is the following:

1) one or more names

2) one or more descriptions

3) information about the UDDI tModel that represents the taxonomy, either
just the key or a full tModel.

Are the names really necessary?  Looking ahead to a proposal, an obvious one
is to use the existing tModel element where the name is the URI of the
taxonomy, and descriptions of the taxonomy are mapped to the descriptions of
the tModel.  The tModelKey attribute obviously holds the key of the tModel.
The overviewDoc of the tModel points to the location of the taxonomy.  As
much or as little of the other content of a tModel element can be used as
required.

John Colgrave
IBM





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