RE: RIM edits: metadata

[Joseph Baran <joebaran@extol.com>]

Jon Bosak wrote:

<<snip>>>
> ExtrinsicObjects catalogue submitted content whose type is not
> intrinsically known to the registry and therefore must be
> described by means of additional attributes (e.g., mime type).
> Examples of content catalogued by ExtrinsicObject include party
> profiles, business process descriptions, and schemas.
>
> ##################################################################
>
> ITEM: table beginning at line 411

(pre-defined types of ExtrinsicObjects)

<<<snip>>>
>
> static int OBJECT_TYPE_XML_SCHEMA
>
> An ExtrinsicObject of this type catalogues an XML schema (DTD, XML
> Schema, RELAX grammar, etc.).  [just a single type for all?]
<<<snip>>>

>>>>  [just a single type for all?]

This innocent little note raises some other questions (perhaps a 
meta-question?):

Whether or not the various XML schema types should get separate type codes, 
it seems (IMO) likely that there will be a need to add to the list of 
"pre-defined types of ExtrinsicObjects" over time.

The technology-dependent nature of the items in this list makes it seem to 
me to be potentially more likely to grow than, for example, the list of 
types of AuditableEvent would be.

So the questions are:

1.	Should the list of pre-defined types of ExtrinsicObjects be extensible?
2.	If so, how does this happen? (i.e., only by a new version of the RegRep 
spec, or in some other, presumably more "lightweight" way)
3.	If the list can grow, how do we handle the interoperability issues - 
e.g., what happens if I try to add a new ExtrinsicObject with a "new" type 
to a registry that doesn't know about the "new" type yet?

Note that if the list is extended by anything "less than" a new version of 
the spec, it implies that there is a "master list" somewhere outside of the 
spec (similar to the list of registered MIME types).

This would seem to open up a few cans of worms...

...Hey, I said I had  _questions_, not  _answers_!   ;-)

Joe Baran