# Presentation: 207882

## Libraries and the W3C:

**Libraries and the W3C:**

- Library of Congress

- Leuven ZIG Meeting, Juluy 2000

## LC and the W3C:History

- Attended two W3C Workshops
- Indexing/Distributed Search - 1996
- Query Language  - 1998

- Joined W3C April 1999

- Attended 2 AC Meetings -
- November 1999
- May 2000

## Do libraries care about the W3C?

- Does the W3C care about libraries?

- No,  not  really.

- No,  not  really.

## Why should libraries care?

- Libraries have a big stake in several activity areas.
- Libraries have significant expertise to offer in several areas  e.g.:
- metadata
- identifiers
- character sets
- information retrieval

## LC’s interest in W3C

- HTML
- Stylesheets
- XML
- Metadata
- graphics
- Character Sets

- Identifiers
- Information Retrieval/Query
- Accessibility
- Digital Signatures
- IPR

## LC’s interest in W3C - Categories

**As a content provider**
**Copyright  Office**
**Nat. Library for Blind and Physically Handicapped**
** ****Library/part of  library community**

## LC’s interest in W3C

- As a content provider
- HTML
- Stylesheets
- XML
- graphics
- Copyright  Office
- Digital Signatures
- IPR
- NLSBPH
- Accessibility

## Library-related interests

- Metadata
- Character Sets
- Identifiers
- Information Retrieval/Query
- Accessibility

## Proposal for  URI Activity

- Proposed at November 1999 AC Meeting
- Dan LaLiberte, Chair
- Proposal seemed well-received (certainly, by LC)
- Proposal withdrawn abruptly, by Tim Berners-Lee, January 2000
- LC was not pleased.

## URIs  (background)

- URI: “uniform resource identifier”
- Originally, a  generalization of:
**URL    **(uniform resource locator),
-  **URN    **(uniform resource name),
-  URC      (uniform resource citation),
- and potentially others,
- but mainly, URL and URN

## The difference (in theory) between URL and URN:

-  a URL is bound to a location
- when resource moves, url changes
- a URN is a name
- thus location independent, and, in theory, persistent  (whatever “persistent” means)

## The Other View

- Distinction between URL and URN is artificial
- Both terms should be abolished and replaced by “URI”
- thus all identifier “schemes” would be URI schemes (even “http”) and no prefix would be necessary (URL, URN, or even URI).

## Reasoning 

- Original URI philosophy:
- URLs were a short-term solution and URNs long-term .
-  URL would be a temporary identification mechanism until a location-independent, persistent  identifier was developed, the URN.
- Now it seems:
-  URNs won’t be any more persistent than URLs – persistence is a social problem, not a technical problem

## Two Views:

- URL
- http:
- ftp:
-  z39.50
- ........
- URN
- nbn:
- hdl:
- URC?

- Http:
- ftp:
- hdl:
- tv:
- urn:
- nbn:
- hdl:

- ?????

- ?????

- End of background

## The Problem

- LC  frustrated with the pace of development and lack of progress
- no coherent URI infrastructure
- no resolution framework

- Frustration!

## URI Issues

- resolution
- registration
- proliferation
- persistence

- Degree of centralization
- referral/re-direction
- support for human readable -and  legacy- identifiers
- separation of metadata from identifier
- Unicode support

- These are the
- primary issues,
- but also........

## Primary URI Issues

- Registration
- “what URI  is used for ISBN?”
- resolution
- “how would it be resolved?”
- proliferation
- URI-scheme evolution must be sufficiently manageable that browsers can implement a core set of schemes so users won't be  constantly downloading plug-ins for different schemes.
- persistence

## “Persistence”it means different things to different people

- Location-independence
- when the resource moves, the identifier remains the same
- uniqueness
- only one identifier for a given resource
- permanence
- once assigned to a resource, the resource will exist forever
- unambiguous - ness
- once assigned to a resource, that identifier may never be assigned to another resource

## LC’s View

-  Persistence is not a technical problem - it’s a social problem, and a problem that neither the IETF nor the W3C is equipped to solve.
- Responsibility for ensuring that URIs( continue to) resolve to the appropriate content should lie with the entity managing that content.
- Different naming schemes will be used with different semantics and administrative policies. Resolvers for a naming scheme will be  responsibility of the body administering  the scheme.

## What’s Missing?

- A framework permitting an evolution of URI schemes sufficiently manageable that browsers can implement a core set of schemes so users won't be  constantly downloading plug-ins for different schemes.
-  More to the point for the library world: *library automation vendors need to know what schemes they need to support. *

## What’s Missing? (continued)

- A deployed mechanism for directing resolution requests to the appropriate resolver.
- An effective technical infrastructure allowing identifiers to be recognized and handled by browsers.
- A single  document  -- for example,  **a W3C technical report or, preferably, a Recommendation **-- that  ties all the information together coherently, and  recommends revision where appropriate.

## The Result

## What is a URI?  Two Views:

- URL
- http:
- ftp:
-  z39.50
- ........
- URN
- nbn:
- hdl:
- URC?

- Http:
- ftp:
- hdl:
- tv:
- urn:
- nbn:
- hdl:

- Old View

- New View

## New URI Interest Group

- New W3C Proposal for a URI Interest Group
- within the Architecture Domain
- to: “Build and maintain shared understanding around URIs technology and specifications”
- mission:  to be responsive to the needs of the W3C membership and WGs for information about URI technology.

## LC’s interest in WAI

- LC is a Federal Agency
- LC includes NLSBPH (National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped)
- Digital talking books
- Web-braille

## Information Retrieval

- XML and Protocols
- Z39.50?
- Z39.50/RDF  integration
- an RDF representation of Z39.50 attribute sets?
- align RDF and Z39.50 data models?
- XML query language  a Z39.50 query type?