Thursday, February 28, 2008
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Monday, February 25, 2008
Sunday, February 24, 2008
This Post Is Ambiguous
When was the last time you had an unambiguous discussion?
In which Roy Fielding asks why the Semantic Web has a requirement that URIs identify a resource unambiguously?
I believe the whole attempt to make a distinction between a "document" and a "non-information resource" is just way too complicated for most users. All this business of redirecting the client from the non-information resource to a document that describes the resource seems like a hack. I understand the problem (does the URI refer to the Thing or the Document About The Thing?) and it's complicated. Take the link I used to point you, the loyal reader, to more information about Roy Fielding. I used http://www.ics.uci.edu/~fielding/ which is some home page for Roy. Is that link pointing to The Man or The Home Page?
My answer? Both. And the semantic web needs to deal with that unambiguity. As far as I can tell, it can. Since anyone can publish metadata about anything on the web, there's nothing un-web about saying that "http://www.ics.uci.edu/~fielding/ is a Home Page" and also "http://www.ics.uci.edu/~fielding/ is a representation for Roy Fielding" It's all about context.
Human deal with this all the time. Take, for example, my name. You can look at "Seth Ladd" as either a string of characters, which form words that have some meaning, or you can look at "Seth Ladd" as an identifier for The Man. Humans are good at noticing when "Seth Ladd" means The Man or The String of Characters. The semantic web will need to deal with this very same ambiguity.
In which Roy Fielding asks why the Semantic Web has a requirement that URIs identify a resource unambiguously?
I believe the whole attempt to make a distinction between a "document" and a "non-information resource" is just way too complicated for most users. All this business of redirecting the client from the non-information resource to a document that describes the resource seems like a hack. I understand the problem (does the URI refer to the Thing or the Document About The Thing?) and it's complicated. Take the link I used to point you, the loyal reader, to more information about Roy Fielding. I used http://www.ics.uci.edu/~fielding/ which is some home page for Roy. Is that link pointing to The Man or The Home Page?
My answer? Both. And the semantic web needs to deal with that unambiguity. As far as I can tell, it can. Since anyone can publish metadata about anything on the web, there's nothing un-web about saying that "http://www.ics.uci.edu/~fielding/ is a Home Page" and also "http://www.ics.uci.edu/~fielding/ is a representation for Roy Fielding" It's all about context.
Human deal with this all the time. Take, for example, my name. You can look at "Seth Ladd" as either a string of characters, which form words that have some meaning, or you can look at "Seth Ladd" as an identifier for The Man. Humans are good at noticing when "Seth Ladd" means The Man or The String of Characters. The semantic web will need to deal with this very same ambiguity.
Friday, February 22, 2008
Thursday, February 21, 2008
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
links for 2008-02-20
When users can't figure out how to use your app, when users pass over your app in favor of something easier or simpler to use, that's the ultimate unit test failure.
Monday, February 18, 2008
Thursday, February 14, 2008
Monday, February 11, 2008
Wednesday, February 6, 2008
links for 2008-02-07
A way to add fancy fonts to web pages without sacrificing accessibility or SEO.
Monday, February 4, 2008
Sunday, February 3, 2008
Saturday, February 2, 2008
Friday, February 1, 2008
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