RE: [xri] ARK IETF draft

["Drummond Reed" <drummond.reed@cordance.net>]

Gabe,

ARK was one of the 30+ identifier schemes that the Core Identifier Workgroup
(http://www.opengroup.org/projects/coreid/) covered in its Identifier Matrix
-- specifically one of the 3-4 persistent URI/IRI schemes. The CoreID Matrix
document is now near final and should be available later this spring.

=Drummond 

-----Original Message-----
From: Robin Cover [mailto:robin@oasis-open.org] 
Sent: Monday, March 05, 2007 3:37 PM
To: Gabe Wachob
Cc: xri@lists.oasis-open.org
Subject: Re: [xri] ARK IETF draft

On Mon, 5 Mar 2007, Gabe Wachob wrote:

> http://www.ietf.org/internet-drafts/draft-kunze-ark-13.txt
>
>
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> This stuff looks awfully familiar. They mention DOI and Handle, but not
XRI.
> I find it a little odd to me that I've never heard of ARK before.

I think it's quite "old" -- languished for some time. but lives on...

http://www.cdlib.org/inside/diglib/ark/arkcdl.pdf

December 2004:

"The ARK Identifier Scheme: A New NISO Registration"

The newest NISO registration is the ARK (Archival Resource Key) Persistent
Identifier Scheme, a collaborative effort with IETF members and the
California Digital Library was approved as a NISO Registration In
December.

ARK facilitates the persistent naming and retrieval of information
objects. It is made up of an identifier syntax and three services, defined
initially to use the HTTP protocol. Details on the scheme can be found at
http://www.ietf.org/internet-drafts/draft-kunze-ark-08.txt.

The NISO Registration Process is a lighter-weight review and accreditation
to existing specifications developed outside the formal standards process.
Approval of a registration such as the ARK requires a 30-day review and
ballot period and approval by 15 percent of the members. Details about the
NISO Registration process are at
http://www.niso.org/registration/registration.html.

[which says:]

Registration Title: The ARK Persistent Identifier Scheme

NISO Member approved date: November 2, 2004
SDC Renewal Approval Date: July 19, 2006

URL of electronic copy: http://www.cdlib.org/inside/diglib/ark/arkspec.pdf

Contact person: John Kunze, Email: jak@ucop.edu

The ARK (Archival Resource Key) is a scheme intended to facilitate the
persistent naming and retrieval of information objects.

The Archival Resource Key (ARK) is relevant to any community that desires
long-term references to information objects. ARK identifiers work in
today's web browsers without compromising the core, technology-independent
identities that they contain, and that are designed to outlast the HTTP
era. ARKs are the only identifiers required, by definition, to connect
users to the three minimum services underlying credible persistence
provision: to the object itself (or a suitable surrogate), to object
metadata, and to a commitment statement.

The ARK scheme is an open, pragmatic, low-cost solution that builds on
experiences gained with predecessor schemes that have addressed the
problem of persistent identification: DOI, URN, and PURL, the OpenURL. All
of these schemes, including ARK, rely on the URL specification itself to
create services that work in today's internet environment.

The ARK scheme was developed at the US National Library of Medicine, with
the current focus of development and maintenance being the California
Digital Library (CDL). The CDL is committed to this scheme and is using
ARKs for all of the digital objects that it owns or controls. The CDL will
assign or delegate assignment of ARKs to all of its contributors,
including the ten campuses of the University of California, the California
State Universities, and the public libraries of California.




>
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> The ARK syntax can be summarized,
>
>                     [http://NMAH/]ark:/NAAN/Name[Qualifier]
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> They even have the concept of a "proxy" HTTP just like ours - see section
> 2.1
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> 2.1.  The Name Mapping Authority Hostport (NMAH)
>
>    Before the "ark:" label may appear an optional Name Mapping Authority
>    Hostport (NMAH) that is a temporary address where ARK service
>    requests may be sent.  It consists of "http://"; (or any service
>    specification valid for a URL) followed by an Internet hostname or
>    hostport combination having the same format and semantics as the
>    hostport part of a URL.  The most important thing about the NMAH is
>    that it is "identity inert" from the point of view of object
>    identification.  In other words, ARKs that differ only in the
>    optional NMAH part identify the same object.  Thus, for example, the
>    following three ARKs are synonyms for just one information object:
>
>                       http://loc.gov/ark:/12025/654xz321
>                   http://rutgers.edu/ark:/12025/654xz321
>                                      ark:/12025/654xz321
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