Comparing these two, the first thing you'd notice is that cowtrails are easier to follow... while standards give a sound base.
If you have to implement a service which conforms to a standard though, you need to have something readable, and standards, while normally explicit, don't necessarily go into much detail about the philosophy or thought processes behind them. I suppose there's the expectation that, if you're reading this standard, you're already "there".
I'm not sure about anyone else, but I found, despite comments like "you don't want to know WTF we were thinking" that getting some idea of these thought processes was useful. Admittedly, my experience is limited, and I've heard various comments about the Z39.88-2004 being over-engineered... but once I saw some of the stuff by Jeff Young on his Q6 blog, OpenURL 1.0 made sense.
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Sunday, April 19, 2009
Cow trails and standards (prelude)
Just when I'm getting my head around something, I hear that what I've learnt could quite likely be irrelevant... such as OAI-PMH (OAI-ORE) and this:
Thankfully, @pkeane has promised an update on this... it's going to be interesting to see how our perceptions change over relatively short periods of time (there's always disruptive technology running amok somewhere).
Also via twitter, (love the way you can talk to anyone - easier than on the street!It's a pity you only get to overhear some of the conversation though be nice to have more of the threading made obvious ala NNTP/newsgroups):
Roderic Page made the comment that "Trick is to have people use it, so that the links get out in the wild" - I'm not sure exactly what this was referring to, but it made me think about standards and cow trails... (now I just need to untangle my thoughts about this...).
"I have little doubt that Atom, a more widely supported specification than OAI-PMH, could supplant OAI-PMH, and I think that would be a good thing. Why? Because we could begin to see a dismantling of the silos that hold “library” or “archive” material on the web and keep it distinct from all of the other great stuff on the web."
http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/pkeane/2008/06/26/oai-ore-atom/
Thankfully, @pkeane has promised an update on this... it's going to be interesting to see how our perceptions change over relatively short periods of time (there's always disruptive technology running amok somewhere).
Also via twitter, (love the way you can talk to anyone - easier than on the street!It's a pity you only get to overhear some of the conversation though be nice to have more of the threading made obvious ala NNTP/newsgroups):
Roderic Page made the comment that "Trick is to have people use it, so that the links get out in the wild" - I'm not sure exactly what this was referring to, but it made me think about standards and cow trails... (now I just need to untangle my thoughts about this...).
Friday, April 10, 2009
twitter (bye, facebook)
You can now reach me at @tompasley on twitter.
I've ditched facebook, so although I decided to leave the option for people to still tag me on photos, etc., my facebook account has gone. Why? I wasn't checking/visiting it often enough, let alone making any postings... I was pretty much cyber-squatting. I've since discovered friendfeed, which was a bit thick (duh), but somehow, I don't think that would've made enough of a difference.
Ultimately, I feel the concept of friends on facebook is artificial and flawed. I prefer the default of twitter, (though I reserve the right to change my mind!), which lets you communicate with anyone, and block those you don't want to to hear from... it's up to those twittering to say something worthwhile.
This way, I can approach people, who do some cool stuff, and if they don't want to hear from me, then they can just ignore me or block me, rather than have to jump through some hoops first, and without having to worry about their email addresses, etc.
Nice.
I've ditched facebook, so although I decided to leave the option for people to still tag me on photos, etc., my facebook account has gone. Why? I wasn't checking/visiting it often enough, let alone making any postings... I was pretty much cyber-squatting. I've since discovered friendfeed, which was a bit thick (duh), but somehow, I don't think that would've made enough of a difference.
Ultimately, I feel the concept of friends on facebook is artificial and flawed. I prefer the default of twitter, (though I reserve the right to change my mind!), which lets you communicate with anyone, and block those you don't want to to hear from... it's up to those twittering to say something worthwhile.
This way, I can approach people, who do some cool stuff, and if they don't want to hear from me, then they can just ignore me or block me, rather than have to jump through some hoops first, and without having to worry about their email addresses, etc.
Nice.
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