OASIS Topic Maps Published Subjects Technical Committee
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Draft Requirements for OASIS Topic Maps Published Subjects TC
This version - November 29, 2001
Status of this document : The content of this page is only informative and should not be used or referred to otherwise.
Please send any comments to Bernard Vatant

1. Statement of Purpose

Whereas most other semantic specifications and languages are resource-centered, Topic Maps are subject-centered. Since every Topic in a Topic Map should be a formal representation of an unique and non-ambiguous subject (abstract or concrete), consistency and efficient interchange of Topic Maps must rely on efficient, non-ambiguous and trustable process for definition and usage of subjects' identity.
Neither ISO 13250 nor XTM 1.0 provide Topic Maps authors, managers and users with any concrete hint of what that process should be, excepted the general recommendation to refer to authoritative Published Subjects. The purpose of OASIS Topic Maps Published Subjects Technical Committee is to promote efficient use of Published Subjects by specifying recommendations, requirements and best practices, for their definition, management and application by ontology managers and topic map engine developers.
It should also provide efficient use cases based on those recommendations.

2. Recommendation for Published Subjects Definition

The TC will recommend a standard syntax for Published Subjects, allowing both human users and topic maps engines, or any other kind of intelligent agents, to identify and use in a non-ambiguous way the elements capturing subject identity and context of publication and use.

The recommendation will address separately the two aspects of Published Subjects:

Subject Indicators, as defined by XTM <subjectIndicatorRef>
They are used as both topic identifiers and pointers to Subject Descriptors.
Their syntax should not be interpreted in a semantic way, but defined and used as e.g. phone numbers or ISBN.

Subject Descriptors, the resources that Subject Descriptors resolve to.
Their syntax should be defined through a DTD and/or XML schema, and be consistent with, and/or use related standards such as RDF description and Dublin Core elements, or other state-of-the-art metadata standards.


3. Recommendation for Published Subjects Management Authority

The TC will recommend a general methodology for Published Subjects Management. That should include at least:

  • Stability of Subject Indicators and permanent availability of Subject Descriptors
  • Permanent visibility and availability of publishing authority
  • Transparency of IPR status and security requirements
  • Liaison and consistency between repositories in the same scope, and with state-of-the-art standards
  • Requirements on process of validation and update
  • Versioning, including backward compatibility with ancient versions

4. Recommendation for Published Subjects Applications and Users

"Published Subjects Applications and Users" include the non-exhaustive following list.
Even if TC recommendations focus mainly on Topic Maps applications, they are not restrictive to those.
They assume that many other agents and applications will take advantage of, and use efficiently, Published Subjects.

  • Semantic Web Agents (Topic Maps engines and parsers, intelligent agents, spiders, search engines ...)
    Those agents will use Published Subjects to control subject identity, merge, bind, or process Topic Maps in any relevant way, on the basis of the identity they provide.
  • Topic Maps authors (either human or any kind of software)
    They will use Published Subjects to identify Topics when creating, updating and modifying Topic Maps.
  • Authors of Ontologies, Thesaurus, and generally speaking all Classification and Indexing tools.

The TC will recommend best practices for those applications and users, including:

  • Consistent technical use of Published Subjects inside Topic Maps and other applications
  • Consistency of Published Subjects usage with the scope intended by Publishers
  • Respect of IPR as intended and declared by Publishers
  • Registration of users by the Publishers, whenever it is relevant and useful for the community of users
  • And more generally, any relevant term of contract between Publishers and Users

5. Use Cases - Registries Management under TC authority

The TC will "eat its own dog food", by building use cases of its own recommendations, that could include:

  • Registries of Generic Published Subjects, e.g. languages, countries, generic relationships and associations widely used in classifications and ontologies.
  • Registries managed by Subcommittees devoted to specific industry fields, e.g. XML industry, Agriculture and Food.