<$BlogRSDUrl$> Marcus P. Zillman, M.S., A.M.H.A. Author/Speaker/Consultant
Marcus P. Zillman, M.S., A.M.H.A. Author/Speaker/Consultant
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Wednesday, October 27, 2004  

Topic Maps
http://www.computerworld.com/news/2004/story/0,11280,96350,00.html

Although they're still not quite ready for prime time. topic maps are something everyone should be aware of. A topic map is simply a kind of data structure (just as an outline or a set of categories is) -- a structure standardized by the International Standards Organization in 2000 (ISO/IEC 13250) as XML Topic Maps, or XTM. The topic map model attaches three "characteristics" to any given topic: its names, its associations with other topics, and its occurrences or "resources." Russell Kay explains names, associations, and occurrences this way in Computerworld: "Names are mainly useful to people in dealing with topics, and a topic doesn't actually need a name: A typical cross-reference (e.g., "see page 12") points to an unnamed topic. Also, we typically group topics according to some notion of type... Associations are the conceptual heart of topic maps, indicating how one topic relates to another. For example, Book A (a topic) is written by (association) Author B (another topic)... Occurrences are the actual references pointers to relevant information resources. Occurrences could include articles, books, images, audio and video segments, application code routines or even people." Kay says that the biggest job in building a topic map lies in defining the set of topics and relationships, finding the relevant occurrences and then examining the data for cross-references, aliases and other helpful tools: "While some pieces of this job, as with book indexing, can be automated (especially for structured data), the biggest part still requires a human imagination to sort out."

posted by Marcus Zillman | 4:10 AM
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