ontology-summit
[Top] [All Lists]

Re: [ontology-summit] Hackathon: BACnet Ontology

To: Ontology Summit 2013 discussion <ontology-summit@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
From: "Barkmeyer, Edward J" <edward.barkmeyer@xxxxxxxx>
Date: Tue, 12 Mar 2013 16:22:38 -0400
Message-id: <63955B982BF1854C96302E6A5908234417DB5F435B@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Toby is right that the original national standards bodies and ISO were based on 
the idea that standards are bound publications on paper, and they are organized 
as publication houses that get their revenues by selling the documents (for 
about the same prices as university textbooks).  Since about 20 years ago, that 
business model has become less and less viable, simply because it is not 
necessary to print the standards on paper.  In information technology more so 
than other industries, publications are downloaded PDF.  That avoids the need 
for a physical publishing plant and the corresponding materials flows -- paper, 
ink, type, etc. -- all of which created capital and operating expenses that 
required a more typical business model.  The declining viability of that model 
is a problem for all publishing houses, not just the standards publishers, but 
the standards organizations have their business model written into their 
charters.  It is not easy to change.    (01)

Publishers, however, have always understood copyright and intellectual property 
and sought to protect it.  It is the fledgeling IT publication organizations 
who have had to learn the hard way about protecting intellectual property.  I 
think you will find that some "old line standards groups", like EIA and ISA and 
ASME and ASHRAE and IEEE and SME and so on have a lot more experience with the 
publication of industry standards and the related intellectual property 
controls.  Online publication has just made it a lot easier for the ignorant 
and the malicious to exploit breaches of copyright and intellectual property 
rights, to the advantage of the exploiter and the disadvantage of the victim.  
So let us not wax too exuberant over the fact that some of the IT world has 
finally figured out how to control part of the collateral damage inflicted by 
the wonder/monster we have unleashed.      (02)

Like OASIS, every one of these consortium standards organizations -- W3C, OMG, 
OAG, IFC, HL7, etc. -- has been reworking its intellectual property and 
licensing rules over the last 3 years, and will doubtless continue to do so for 
a while.  We are, as an industry, trying to learn how to manage online 
publication and open process authorship.  Some have tried to learn from the 
publishing houses; others still believe themselves to be revolutionaries.  Some 
endeavor to manage their standards suites; others are simply new model 
publishing companies for arbitrary special interest groups.  And that 
difference affects their IP rules as well.    (03)

A further observation about the UNECE reference:  UNECE has been publishing the 
EDIFACT dictionaries for 20 years, and EDIFACT was a functional part of 
international trade before XML was invented.  The specifications have been 
downloadable since at least 1996 in plain text, and since 2000 in HTML.  The 
standard data encoding follows a UNECE spec published by ISO as ISO 9735.  90% 
of electronic trade messages are EDIFACT messages; about 10% now use the XML 
versions of the messages (because software systems supporting the long-standing 
standard have been in use since the 1990s).  The published codes have been a 
part of the dictionaries since the beginning.  The XML version has changed 
nothing but the ability to attract implementations by the people who are now 
entering the software market.  Changing message forms is pure cost.  And OBTW, 
the XML messages tend to need about 6 times as many bits to carry the same 
information.  The advantage of XML is that you can hire programmers who know 
how to manipulate XML using libraries they are familiar with, and they don't 
have to learn how to use the older libraries for EDI exchange and couple them 
to "cloud services" (or whatever the buzzword of the year is).      (04)

-Ed    (05)

--
Edward J. Barkmeyer                     Email: edbark@xxxxxxxx
National Institute of Standards & Technology
Systems Integration Division
100 Bureau Drive, Stop 8263             Work:   +1 301-975-3528
Gaithersburg, MD 20899-8263             Mobile: +1 240-672-5800    (06)

"The opinions expressed above do not reflect consensus of NIST, 
 and have not been reviewed by any Government authority."    (07)



From: ontology-summit-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 
[mailto:ontology-summit-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Considine, Toby 
(Campus Services IT)
Sent: Monday, March 11, 2013 6:12 PM
To: 'Ontology Summit 2013 discussion'
Subject: Re: [ontology-summit] Hackathon: BACnet Ontology    (08)

Deborah nails it.    (09)

The old-line standards groups charge for access. Even if you get the document, 
the IP may have questionable provenance.    (010)

Sometimes some agencies have explicitly made some standards work public. Look 
to what UN-CEFACT has done with country and currency codes.    (011)

http://www.unece.org/cefact/codesfortrade/codes_index.html    (012)

They have produced XML Schemas (XSD) that are freely downloadable, freely 
accessible, and so have increased rather then decreased trade.     (013)

Some standards are developed from scratch to be used freely by all. UBL 
(Universal Business Language) does what this thread suggests and every bit of 
it is freely usable.    (014)

One problem is the revenue model. Standards groups who get their revenues from 
specifications are not going to want to solve IP issues. If the revenue model 
is tied to per-page charges, you can expect wordy documents with lots of 
pictures.    (015)

Sometimes groups produce where the IP  is only that "No member will sue you if 
you are a member"-if only they would state it so succinctly. This means that 
fewer review the specification, fewer comment, and the specification is often 
harder to work with.    (016)

I like to work in OASIS (www.oasis-open.org) because its products are generally 
free to use, free to download, free to build derivative products. The IP gate 
is on the contribution, rather than the use. Every email, posting, and proposal 
is publicly visible, which cuts through a lot of delays. Building-based 
semantics in OASIS is hard to come by.    (017)

tc
________________________________________
"Computers are useless. They can only give you answers."     -- Pablo Picasso  
________________________________________
Toby Considine
Chair, OASIS oBIX TC
Editor, OASIS EMIX, Energy Interoperation
Campus Services Information Technology
University of North Carolina
Chapel Hill, NC
  
Email: Toby.Considine@ unc.edu
Phone: (919)962-9073 
http://www.oasis-open.org 
http://www.NewDaedalus.com    (018)


From: ontology-summit-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 
[mailto:ontology-summit-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of MacPherson, 
Deborah
Sent: Monday, March 11, 2013 5:56 PM
To: Ontology Summit 2013 discussion
Subject: Re: [ontology-summit] Hackathon: BACnet Ontology    (019)

Somewhere in this discussion is a problem that is the essence of what has been 
holding up progress in the facilities domain.     (020)

There are ways to publish technical requirements or test for conformance online 
for free, and pay (even substantially) to participate in the working groups or 
have voting privileges. For example OGC, W3C.     (021)

I can even see being able to own a part name or number within a larger 
communication machine that could be mapped to a generic form for broader 
exchange purposes. For example "13-57 13 15 Dining and Drinking Spaces" versus 
"The Sand Bar and Grille"    (022)

Depending on the domain, or need for cross disciplinary discussion, many on the 
 IP-protected side have no interest in supporting, or will even actively stops 
progress, on a common model. There is also the problem of failed common models 
that do not work, will not accommodate different object definitions - from 
software to software or industry model to industry model - without loss of data 
or functionality. Bentley systems has stepped forward in this white paper on 
the IFC model to say actually - the emperor has no clothes on. See pages 6 and 
7 "Round Tripping"     (023)

For some reason I think ontologies might be a way these IP-With-Open problems 
might be fixed but maybe I am wrong or wishing for too much.    (024)

DEBORAH MACPHERSON
Specifications and Research    (025)

Cannon Design
3030 Clarendon Blvd. 
Suite 500
Arlington, VA 22201 
 
Phone: 703.907.2353
Direct Dial: 2353    (026)

dmacpherson@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 
Cannondesign.com  
Skype debmacp    (027)

From: ontology-summit-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 
[mailto:ontology-summit-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Simon Spero
Sent: Monday, March 11, 2013 5:25 PM
To: Ontology Summit 2013 discussion
Subject: Re: [ontology-summit] Hackathon: BACnet Ontology    (028)

On Mon, Mar 11, 2013 at 11:53 AM, Peter R. Benson <Peter.Benson@xxxxxxxxx> 
wrote:
Deborah, IP is a real issue. We designed the eOTD to try to resolve some of
these issues. In a dictionary the IP resides in the representation but also
in the identifiers or codes as these are always copyright.     (029)

That is not entirely clear;  see e.g.  SOUTHCO, INC v. KANEBRIDGE CORPORATION (
 http://www.ca3.uscourts.gov/opinarch/021243pe.pdf ), where part numbers were 
found to be not protected (but see also how Alito takes care to distinguish 
Delta Dental )    (030)

Simon    (031)

_________________________________________________________________
Msg Archives: http://ontolog.cim3.net/forum/ontology-summit/   
Subscribe/Config: http://ontolog.cim3.net/mailman/listinfo/ontology-summit/  
Unsubscribe: mailto:ontology-summit-leave@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Community Files: http://ontolog.cim3.net/file/work/OntologySummit2013/
Community Wiki: http://ontolog.cim3.net/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?OntologySummit2013  
Community Portal: http://ontolog.cim3.net/wiki/     (032)
<Prev in Thread] Current Thread [Next in Thread>