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Sunday, March 26, 2006

Slashdot | Tim Berners-Lee on the Web

Isn't it semantic? British Computer Society interview with Tim Berners-Lee: Berners-Lee says he got domain names backwards in web addresses, criticizes software patents, US and ICANN control of the Internet & suggests browser security changes.

What would Berners-Lee do differently?

He replies"I would have skipped on the double slash - there's no need for it. Also I would have put the domain name in the reverse order - in order of size."


He states that "The Google algorithm was a significant development."

Asked: "How does the ICANN ownership issue affect the Web?" He answers "The Domain Name Server (DNS) is the Achilles heel of the Web."

Most interesting to me is the following on semantics: "Ian Horrocks spoke to the BCS on ontologies, the application of which would clearly see a true Semantic Web, but how can we apply these principles to the billions of existing Web pages?

Don't. Web pages are designed for people. For the Semantic Web we need to look at existing databases and the data in them.

To make this information useful semantically requires a sequence of events:

1. Do a model of what's in the database - which would give you an ontology you could work out on the back of an envelope;
2. Find out who else uses those terms and cherry pick them for your ontology;
3. Write a schema (perhaps with OWL (the Web ontology language);
4. Write down how your database connects to those things.

Using this information you can set up a Web server that runs resource description framework (RDF). A larger database could support queries.

To make all this really useful it's important that products have URIs (Uniform Resource Identifiers) - for example, products@RDF#hairdryers - so invoices, shipping notes, product specifications and so on can use it.

These would all be virtual RDF files - the server would generate them on the fly and it would all be available on the Semantic Web. Then an individual could compare products directly by their specifications, weight and delivery charges, price and so on, in a way that HTML won't allow."

Brian Eno gave a speech a few years ago on generative music - he said that he likes the economy of it, that just from a few simple rules complex and fascinating things can arise. How good an analogy for the rise of the Web from a relatively simple approach - hypertext and links - is this?

This is where Web engineering, physics, Web science and philosophical engineering meet. Physics was actually called experimental philosophy at Oxford.

The Web is now philosophical engineering. Physics and the Web are both about the relationship between the small and the large....So we could say we want the Web to reflect a vision of the world where everything is done democratically, where we have an informed electorate and accountable officials. To do that we get computers to talk with each other in such a way as to promote that ideal....

Berners-Lee concludes: "Web development is at a multi-way crossroads. There are a huge number of developments that are potentially world changing and there's a lot of excitement.... Going back to the idea of anything I would change, I remember Dan Connolly - who really understood SGML - asking me if HTML was SGML. I really wanted the SGML people on board so I said yes.

I should have said no - and we would have developed XML a lot sooner. This all happened at the beginning of the Web, in a pub in Edinburgh. This May there'll be discussions in pubs in Edinburgh again, where we can talk about what we’ll need to change now - it'll be a blast."


Vaguely interesting Slashdot discussion re above British Computer Society interview with Tim Berners-Lee though it focuses on domain names to the detriment of semantic web etc...Slashdot | Tim Berners-Lee on the Web: "Tim Berners-Lee on the Web "

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