I wonder if this whole exchange isn't indicative of a gap that exists
between the theory and the everyday reality of TopicMaps.
I've been following this list for a number of months and I've learned a
great deal. However and for whatever reasons, I have yet to actualy "do"
a TM. One possible explanation is that, even after a fair amount of
reading (including 'the book') and list watching, I still can't see a
clear path for myself toward using TM's in my own little website world.
Jon Udell, who unfortunately wrote a misleading item, has tried to show
people how to do a rudimentary form of indexing/bookmarking/whatever. In
contrast, on this list, the level of discussion is uniformly high, even
elevated, but it is often less than useful for a hacker or experimenter.
The available TM software is either incomplete, outdated or proprietary.
The business model appears to be, "Believe in Topic Maps and we [the
consultant/vendor] will take care of the rest... [for a fee.]"
Please don't misunderstand what I say as cynical criticism. I think it
is simply one typical reality that exists around a new and, by some,
highly prized (as in this is my baby) technology. However, if Topic Maps
are to take off in terms of either "thought share" or market share, the
accessibility of the TM enterprise needs to be brought down a few
levels. It's fine to comment of Jon Udell's misunderstanding and
misrepresentation of Topic Maps; but it is not useful, in my view, to
spit over the wall in a "we versus they" fashion. Perhaps better to
engage Udell in some sort of constructive discussion about how his
O'Reilly soap box can be put to better use in the cause of Topic Maps
and also how his example can be improved and made more powerful through
introduction of the added capabilities of real Topic Maps, always using
the hacker/experimenter approach. If the learning curve can't be managed
approprietly, there is every possibility that alternative approaches,
whether diluted, distorted or W3C supported, will take over the field.
With well intended regards. ...edN
Kal Ahmed wrote:
Unfortunately it would appear that Mr. Udell has attempted to hijack the
phrase "topic map" as what he describes there might be a topic map, but
its "not a topic map as we know it, Jim".
What Mr. Udell describes is, as far as I can see, just simple
categorisation - he creates a category (calling it a topic) and then
attaches one or more resource addresses to each category. You can do the
same thing in topic maps by creating topics and adding occurrences to
them. You can do much more with topic maps besides this - you can create
relationships between topics...any kind of relationship you can think of
in fact; and you can use types and scope to make the information you put
into your topic map as valuable as the resources that it points to.
Topic maps in the form that we understand them are described in a number
of papers. Check out my on-line topic map [1], or Murray Woodmans
excellent portal[2] for links to papers, articles and other resources.
While you are surfing, you can download the XTM file that my from [3] to
see what a *real* topic map file looks like ;-)
Cheers,
Kal
[1] http://www.techquila.com/topicmaps/tmworld/
[2] http://www.topicmap.com/
[3] http://www.techquila.com/tmsamples/xtm/tmworld.xtm
On Thu, 2003-02-20 at 17:56, joshua wrote:
I just finished reading Jon Udell's article, "Quick and Dirty Topic Mapping" (
http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/webservices/2002/01/01/topic_map.html?page=last#thread ).I'm a
newbie and am wondering if someone out there can provide a more detailed explanation of the
"mapping file." Or, if there's a good site I can reference. Is this XML related?
Thanks,
Joshua
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