On Mon, 18 May 2009 21:02:56 -0400, Ross Singer <rossfsinger_at_GMAIL.COM> wrote:
>But the SKOS has not replaced the MARC. The prefLabel is just that, a
>human readable label. Our machines should not be trying to bust it
>apart and infer meaning in it, since that's the whole point of the
>URI.
I don't believer that is what I am saying. It's that the heading
"Aeronautics, Military--Accidents--Italy, Northern--History" is a
conglomeration of lots of concepts, and giving them all one URI doesn't seem
to be the best solution.
It would seem to me that the better solution is to give each subdivision a
separate URI and then the record can bring the URIs together in different
ways. in this case:
http://id.loc.gov/authorities/sh85001371
http://id.loc.gov/authorities/sh99002078
http://id.loc.gov/authorities/sh85069034
http://id.loc.gov/authorities/sh99005024
Again, it would be far better to bring these together with the additional
semantics, topical, geographic, chronological and genre. In either case, the
heading would be just as human readable as today, and could look exactly the
same, if that's what somebody wants.
Providing this type of access would also allow a lot more flexibility to
display the headings both within the library catalog, and allow for more
possibilities to interoperate with other thesauri in coherent ways. Plus, I
think it would let the entire system work far more efficiently, while being
much less complex.
Jim Weinheimer
Received on Tue May 19 2009 - 05:10:39 EDT