Format of tokens

[Rob Seaman]

Hi Rick,

>> VOEvent could have used an officially blessed list of concepts two  
>> years ago. The alpha (perhaps not the omega) of the semantic web  
>> is in labeling objects according to a widely known vocabulary (or - 
>> ies). The only way to reach the far end of the Greek alphabet is  
>> to start at the beginning. Let's bless the SKOSified IAU Thesaurus,
>
> Ack!  Say you meant the new and improved IVOAT thesaurus - the old  
> IAU thesaurus is old-fashioned, highly incomplete and down-right  
> wrong in places.  There is not a single advantage of using the IAU  
> over the IVOAT thesauri since the IVOA represents the IAU, so we  
> can quickly make IVOAT as official as the original.  All we have to  
> say is that the old list has been modernized and made SKOS- 
> compatible - which is perfectly correct.

We're presenting work derived from previous effort.  We should keep  
the changes to modernizing the representation and the correction of  
overt errors.  Adding content should either be accomplished via  
separate word lists, or should be done in conformance with the  
pertinent IAU Commission, not solely under IVOA working groups.  The  
easiest way to do this is to recruit the original authors to comment  
and hopefully bless the effort.

It is in the IVOA's own best interest to aggressively pursue  
collaboration with the broader astronomical community via the IAU.

>> add additional application specific word lists, and start tagging  
>> our varied and sundry data objects. Give it a couple of years and  
>> then, perhaps, we'll all find renewed interest in seeing what  
>> ontologies can bring to the IVOA Bar Mitzvah after a few guests  
>> have gathered.
> I have suggested to the VOEvent community on repeated occations  
> that we quickly glance through the current list (I've already sent  
> around a good selection), pick out what one needs (a relatively  
> simple task), think about what's missing (a more painful task, but  
> easy relative to starting from scratch) and get started.   As soon  
> as we've officially asked the IVOA to adopt SKOS as the minimally  
> conforming format, there's no reason why groups like VOEvent can't  
> be already past the starting-block stage.   The selection of tokens/ 
> labels needed is initially utterly independent of the vocabulary  
> format.

Ok, VOEvent wonks - get to work!

> For the benefit of our ontology colleagues, I've really been trying  
> to clean up the IAU ontology entries as I go along so that we can  
> have the best of both worlds: the starting vocabulary for Rob et  
> al. and basic ontological info for those who might be able to use  
> it.  Thus, we don't have to wait for the Bar Mitzvah to see if our  
> colleagues can make a good ontological case - it would be good  
> enough to see some hot pastrami made out of the present vocabulary.

Would you like sauerkraut with your SKosher semantics?

- Rob