Hey Everyone! This is just a friendly reminder about Our Weekly IRC Chat: The whole group meets every Wednesday at 3PM GMT/UTC (that is 8AM PDT, 11AM EDT) on the IRC channel #openkollab. It’s been another insane week at OpenKollab! A week marked by intense discussion and dialogue around a range of different issues. We are in the early stages of discussion regarding what the architecture of the OpenKollaboration Platform should be and, in keeping with the very early stage nature of this project, the discussion surrounded two very fundamental issues: syntax and ontology. Namely the related questions are:
SYNTAX AND ONTOLOGY Syntax: What should the syntactic structure of information be such that users can easily interface with the platform? This leads to another related question: Ontology: Should the structure of information in the system be organized according to a completely distributed peer to peer model with the user defining the meta-data (tagging model) or should there be some top-down influence (ontology model). Clearly syntax and ontological considerations can’t be separated, but the discussions have been in parallel. Initially, a proposal was advanced suggesting that we look at the problem in terms of relational operators that would help to link an organizations needs to offers of resources available etc. Details of this can be found at: http://wiki.openkollab.com/wagn/Syntactic_Considerations_for_Natural_Language_Input_of_Project_Needs_Resources_and_Goals_as_advanced_by_Suresh_Fernando_Aug_13_2009 For the clearest articulation of the case for a distributed P2P information system, read Clay Shirky’s piece: Ontology is overrated (http://www.shirky.com/writings/ontology_overrated.html For an argument in favour of the ontology model in the context of a collaborative platform see: http://wiki.openkollab.com/wagn/OK_Ontological_Considerations The latest architectural proposal, Tent as advanced by Tav, is distributed architecture model that can provide the underpinnings for a system that will make possible what is required by those that are advancing the argument in favour of the importance of ontology in this context. Initial thoughts on the tent proposal can be found at: http://wiki.openkollab.com/wagn/Tent_as_advanced_by_Tav_on_Aug_14_2009 WHAT SHOULD BE THE PRIMARY LEVEL OF DESCRIPTION? – Projects, individuals or… Another area around which there was some discussion was the question as to what the primary level of description should be. Gerry suggested that it should not be the project level (http://wiki.openkollab.com/wagn/Gerry_raises_the_question, Suresh argues in favour of projects (http://wiki.openkollab.com/wagn/ Suresh_s_argument_in_favour_of_projects) SUPER-ORDINATE AND SUB-ORDINATE GOALS Since the aim of the OK Collaboration Platform is to drive collaboration, one issue that requires detailed consideration is how to think about the goals of organizations. What do we need to know and how can we link them. An initial proposal relating to this can be found at: http://wiki.openkollab.com/wagn/OPENKOLLAB_SUPER_AND_SUBORDINATE_GOALS Virtual Currencies Another thread that emerged was the issue of virtual currencies – mechanisms that allow us to compensate those that are contributing to the collaborative process. Gerry initially raised the issue: http://wiki.openkollab.com/wagn/Gerry_raises_the_issue Gerry and Suresh dig a little deeper: http://wiki.openkollab.com/wagn/Gerry_and_Suresh_dig_deeper INTERESTING RELATED APPLICATIONS Alex also introduced a couple of really interesting wordpress plug-ins that can link you to interesting blog posts, paragraphs and even sentences based upon keywords within your own posts. Details can be found at: http://wiki.openkollab.com/wagn/Collaboration_Tools_Discussion SUB PROJECTS One sub-project that we could really use your help with is Project Mapping. We are aiming to manually gather data on a number of companies to begin a ‘bottom-up’ process of driving collaboration. This will complement the more top down approach that will, in time, be driven by our platform. See Gerry’s comments (http:// wiki.openkollab.com/wagn/Process_Dialogue) It also supports our efforts by providing us with specific information on exactly what sorts of information about companies is actually required in order to make collaboration happen. This is information that will be necessary to make the OK Collaboration Platform actually work! Information on this sub-project can be found at: Project Mapping: http://wiki.openkollab.com/wagn/ProjectMapping Project Info: http://wiki.openkollab.com/wagn/ProjectInfo Suresh Fernando http://wiki.openkollab.com http://radical-inclusion.com --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "CooperationCommons" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/cooperationcommons?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
