IngentaConnect RSS Feed Tweaks

I released a couple of tweaks to the IngentaConnect RSS feeds recently. The most notable addition being the inclusion of foaf:maker properties to associate authors with articles, and inclusion of authors as foaf:Person resources. I've added these alongside the existing dc:creator properties to ensure that Dublin Core aware aggregators can still do something useful with … Continue reading IngentaConnect RSS Feed Tweaks →

Microformats and REST

Just noticed Danny's posting about the new microformat-rest mailing list. I was going to start analysing this but see that Joe Gregorio has already done a good job. I don't think that microformats have much to add to REST as an architectural pattern. It certainly doesn't merit subsetting its use with HTTP; that definitely is … Continue reading Microformats and REST →

RDF and Syntax, Part 2

And now a quote from Bruce D'Arcus: Last week at the Access 2005 conference, I told a room full of mostly library people that their XML standards (I was talking about MODS and MADS in particular) are needlessly complex, inflexible, and awkward; that they were not hacker-friendly. I showed them an alternative schema I've been … Continue reading RDF and Syntax, Part 2 →

RDF and Syntax

Two quotes from Dan Brickley: Sometimes there are emergent properties of a set of sensible, well motivated decisions grounded in a whole load of subtle constraints. From Why Is RDF The Way It Is? ...we should also stop looking over our shoulder at XML. RDF/XML is painful for XML developers because they find themselves lacking … Continue reading RDF and Syntax →

Notes on Creating the WebJay API

Am catching up a bit here as I've been on holiday and then away travelling over the last few weeks. Lucas Gonze has written up an excellent response to my XTech paper discussing the design decisions and trade-offs he encountered whilst designing the WebJay API. This was exactly the kind of discussion and sharing I … Continue reading Notes on Creating the WebJay API →

X-DOAP

Danny's discussion about sending FOAF URLs as HTTP headers reminded me that I'd not yet followed up on some similar proposals I'd made at XTech 2005. In particular, the use of DOAP descriptions instead of "API Keys" for RESTful interfaces. In my paper after reviewing how services supported authentication and linking of resources, I wrote: … Continue reading X-DOAP →

Smushing Algorithms

I was pleased to see Leo Sauermann recently publish a draft smushing algorithm as he's saved me a job! There's some subsequent discussion on the ESW wiki. I agree with Sauermann that this is an underspecified but significant area. I also suspect there's room for a range of algorithms optimised for different purposes. For example, … Continue reading Smushing Algorithms →

Due Diligence

According to the Wikipedia due diligence is "the effort a party makes to avoid harm to another party.". It goes on to note that within a business context: A "due diligence report" is often prepared to discover all risks and implications regarding a decision to be made. I think this concept should be embraced by … Continue reading Due Diligence →

RDF and Library Metadata Interoperability

I've been having an interesting email discussion with Bruce D'Arcus and Richard Newman as a result of Bruce pointing us both at this posting on Metadata Interoperability by Kevin Clarke. I thought I'd write up some points to respond to that article here, in particular on the use (or lack of use) of RDF in … Continue reading RDF and Library Metadata Interoperability →

Fun with Jena Rules

Today's lunchtime special involves fun with the Jena 2 rule engine. I've been wondering for a while whether it'd be possible to extracting richer metadata from tagging conventions. Of course it's possible, I'm just playing with different ways to achieve it. Quick XSLT conversions are my normal method of choice, but I wanted to have … Continue reading Fun with Jena Rules →