re discussion topics

[Terry Allen <tallen@sonic.net>]

(I trimmed the distribution list.)

Duane wrote:
| Terry Allen wrote:
| 
| >per ISO 11179, every data element has unique identifier.  By
| >administrative necessity, every registered item will have to have
| >a unique identifier.
| 
| 
| Terry - agreed!  I have been standing on a soap (the non microsoft kind) box
| and shouting this out for a while.  For an XML query to work into a
| Repository like mechanism,  it must return one and one only results.  If you

No, there's no reason that you could not query *the metadata in a
registry* for all the items that match a given set of criteria;
the reason for needing a unique identifier is that you need to
be able to refer to a registered item by it.

| allow cowboys to start randomly naming their data elements with non-unique
| identifiers, the entire model won't funtion.
| 
| There are two issues that have come out of my rantings:
| 
| FIRST ISSUE:
| 1) What those unique identifiers will be?
| 
| My thoughts here are that they should be semantically meaningless for two
| reasons -

This issue is a well known rat hole.  There is no reason for EBXML to
care whether identifiers are meaningful.  There is also no reason for
EBXML to specify anything further about them except that they be URNs.

|   a) becuase they are being used as keys by applications (within ebXML) for
| queries and applications don;t care about the semantic meanign of a word,
| they care about syntax only.  Humans who query a repository to find data
| element can search on more meaningful points to locate the semantic
| equivalent that suits them.
| 
|   b) The political upheavel it could potentially cause.  Some have suggested
| that a first come first serve basis should apply.  Well,  if I go to a
| repository authority first and name VIN number data element
| "Fords_Rules!!!", I think that general motors may get upset.  This is pretty
| drastic but I have seen [nameless] standards people red in the face shouting
| becuase they want their way or the highway.

I don't understand the example; in any event there's no reason a registered
item cannot have more than one unique identifier - and some will have, as
they already do.

| SECOND ISSUE:
| 2) Are empty elements in an XML document instance required to reference a
| data element unique identifier so they may be retrieved from a repository?

That's not an issue for ebxml-regrep.

| I think yes.  IT is important to know what the node is, even when it is
| blank.  This would allow for less chance of error at the receiving and in a
| document choreography.

Someone already pointed out that the definition of semantics goes in
the schema, not the instance.


regards, Terry