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Re: [ontolog-forum] Globally unique definitions (was tasteful tags)

To: Pat Hayes <phayes@xxxxxxx>
Cc: "[ontolog-forum]" <ontolog-forum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
From: "John F. Sowa" <sowa@xxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Sat, 10 Mar 2007 01:53:28 -0500
Message-id: <45F255E8.2080506@xxxxxxxxxxx>
Pat,    (01)

I'm all in favor of global accessing schemes.    (02)

But I'm also in favor of context-dependent schemes
and globally unique mobile schemes.  All of them
have important uses.  And it would be desirable
to support all of them in a systematic way that
could accommodate different kinds of names within
a common framework.    (03)

I also like PHP.  It came out of nowhere with no
backing from any standards body, and rose to prominence
very quickly because it filled an important niche.    (04)

A few comments:    (05)

 > Redirection is part of the basic machinery of the internet,
 > and has been since day one.    (06)

Yes.  It's a very flexible technique with lots of useful
applications.  What I was complaining about is that one
useful scheme, globally unique names, are directly supported.
But other useful schemes, such as context-dependent names
or unique mobile names, have no direct support.    (07)

If all three of these methods were supported as part of
a comprehensive and flexible naming system, it would be
possible to integrate them and use them more easily.    (08)

 > you should find out more about the actual Web architecture
 > before saying such crazy things.    (09)

Yes, I have been following the architecture for years.
Much of it is very good.    (010)

 > Why would you want any Internet-based communication process
 > to be done without assistance from the Internet servers?    (011)

The domain servers are designed to propagate the global name
changes across the world on a time scale of hours or days.
For mobile agents (which could be people, vehicles, or software
bots), things can move at millisecond rates or faster.    (012)

It would be convenient to have the slowly changing backbone
interact smoothly with a rapidly changing overlay of mobile
agents.  Such interactions could be simulated by building a
virtual mobile web on top of the slowly changing web, but
it would be more convenient if the two layers could be better
integrated.    (013)

 > Well, there have been many such schemes....    (014)

That's the problem.  It's better to have one good scheme than
to force every application that needs one to develop its own
special case that is incompatible with everybody else's.    (015)

 > The fact is that all such schemes are inevitably overtaken
 > by the exponents in Moore's Law within a few years. Its far,
 > far cheaper to just use the actual Web, as well as being
 > more robust.    (016)

I agree that it would be more robust if the actual web
would support things that move around, such as an agent
whose supporting software might execute on different
physical nodes of the web, while retaining the same URI.
But it doesn't.    (017)

John    (018)


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