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RE: XML Schemas: Best Practices

• From: "Bullard, Claude L (Len)" <clbullar@i...>
• To: "Hodder, Ed" <Ed.Hodder@B...>,"XML-Dev (E-mail)" <xml-dev@l...>
• Date: Mon, 27 Nov 2000 17:02:13 -0600

Not "until machines think" but "As We 
May Think".

Perhaps it will work better if instead of 
trying to figure out if schemas provide 
semantics, the thread should look at  
stochastic processes and work out which 
kinds of schemas improve the uncertainty 
problem of choosing among a set of equally 
probable next terms.  That, IMO, is the 
actual reason we use multiple application 
vocabularies: improving the coding to 
compress the communication.  All a 
semantic web does is restrict the domain 
of a function for choosing among alternatives.  

Hooray.  We can drop the rant about an 
"intelligent web".  Message to MS: reel 
in the Boss.  He is dripping.

"The fundamental problem of communication is 
that of reproducing at one point either exactly 
or approximately a message selected at another 
point.  Frequently the messages have meaning; 
that is, they refer to or are correlated according 
to some **system** with certain physical or 
conceptual entities.  These semantic aspects of 
communication are irrelevant to the engineering 
problem.  The significant aspect is that the 
actual message is one selected from a set of 
possible messages.  The **system must be designed 
to operate for each possible selection not just the 
one that will actually be chosen since this is
unknown at the time of design."

A Mathematical Theory of Communication
Claude Shannon - 1948 

Asterisk emphasis on **system** is mine.

Len 
http://www.mp3.com/LenBullard

Ekam sat.h, Vipraah bahudhaa vadanti.
Daamyata. Datta. Dayadhvam.h

-----Original Message-----
From: Hodder, Ed [mailto:Ed.Hodder@B...]

Two things. First, the above sentence should be "So to my mind there is no
absolute semantics, or more precisely meaning, to jdkdsfjkds."

Second, if instead of laying down an absolute definition of 'car' or better
'title' you could define or describe the context where it means one thing
instead of another then you might be on to something. But then you'd have to
count on users or developers putting it in the right context and you might
as well be using Word again. Until machines think . . .

Are there any linguists at the W3?

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