Jan Algermissen wrote:
http://www.rtodd.com/blog/archives/2005/08/the_trouble_wit.htm
Hmm....
True/False?
I think his arguments misses the point, and have made the following
comments in the blog:
I think there are two main problems with the arguments here:
1. Comparing different levels of abstraction
2. Mixing ‘end user’ with 'developer'
Designing a Topic Map is comparable to designing a database or
ontology. Comparing it to making an html web page or using google is
missing the point completely.
As a matter of fact Topic Maps is one of the metamodels included in the
OMG 'Ontology Definition Metamodel' RFP:
http://www.omg.org/ontology/ontology_info.htm
>> We have got to get better and communicating technology to the masses.
Considering that "a five year old" and "the majority of people" is used
in the examples, it seems like he is talking about end users, not
developers.
Why should an end user care what kind of base technology the
application use? You have to differentiate between developers and end
users.
The developer has to choose the appropriate technology to use, and the
end user may judge the result. A book index, for instance, is simple to
use, but can be hard to construct. The user doesn’t have to know
anything about how to make an index however.
Your average Google user wouldn't want to write html tags, which was
necessary the first years of building the web. In the case of HTML, the
technology was easy for any developer to code and error tolerant.
Most of the Topic Maps based web applications I know of look like any
well designed web application to the user. Just like the Google
interface looks like any search engine. - Which is probably why he
haven't noticed the use of the TM technology lately.
Most Topic Maps based applications have a standard forms-based web
interface for end user editing, just like any normal web application.
>> tools emerged where a five year old could build a web page
It’s tempting to argue here, but let’s say we agree that most five year
olds don’t read and write, and use the term “school kid”.
The Norwegian company Cerpus have made the application Brainbank, which
is made to be used by school kids:
http://cerpus.com/
Best Regards,
Are D. Gulbrandsen
The XML-group,
Center for Information Technology Services
University of Oslo
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