Dear all, please calm down. No reason to be or feel offended, or to offend.
It's better to speak of ones own fears, so here I go: My fears are that - we might loose Yaron as a very important contributor to the SMW ecosystem because he throws his attention now to exclusively to Cargo - that cargo will not be something that can be seamlessly used within SMW and therefore we SMW users can benefit from it, but (as it currently seems) we have to make this either-or-decision. It currently feels like it and it is not a good feeling. But it's certainly not too late for steps in this direction (to see Cargo as an addition to the SMW ecosystem) - many users and developers of SMW will switch to cargo and abandon SMW Again, these are my worries, not my predictions. It might also be the case that Cargo does not get enough attention, will not be maintained enough and will not be there long. Many other very promising extensions have had this kind of fate. Or, for the better, it might turn out that we SMW users can use future versions of cargo or integrate some of its components to something that adds value to SMW. When Wikidata came, the intention was clear: to do the job of providing structured data for wikipiedia. Wikimedia hired some of the core SMW developers team, borrowed code, but also promised to give something back. As SMW is still very alive after/alongside Wikidata, we can see that it worked out fine. Yaron, I think this is where you should clarify: do you see a peaceful coexistens and integration possibilities or is this your start to move away from SMW, trying to promote an alternative to SMW and trying to get others aboard? With Semantic Forms, you did something very important: you hid a great bunch of complexity of SMW from the end user, thus making SMW what it is today, so I wonder why you did not tackle the next usability problems in the same way, but went in the direction of providing an alternative, not an addition to SMW? cheers, Bernhard ----- Am 13. Jan 2015 um 23:25 schrieb chris tharp tharpena...@gmail.com: > As a long time user of Semantic Mediaiwki I thought I should point out a > few things: > > 1. According to extension page inside Mediawiki the defining aspect of SMW > is as follows: *Semantic MediaWiki* is an extension for managing structured > data in your wiki and for querying that data to create dynamic > representations: tables, timelines, maps, lists, etc. ( > https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:Semantic_MediaWiki ). Please > notice triples, RDF and OWL are not mentioned. Like Yaron, I would be > willing to bet, 90% of the users of SMW are not concerned with them. > 2. The SMW extension page lists similar extensions: Wikibase, > DynamicPageList, and WikiDB. Surely Cargo fits within this list. > 3. Cargo may or may not be equal to, or better then, SMW from many > different perspectives. Someone who needs those aspects unique to SMW will, > no doubt, find Cargo a pale mimic, but others will find Cargo a blessing > (like all the poor bastards who can't run composer for some reason). > > What harms a community is when anyone attacks another it on the basis of > personal attacks. A "falsehood" implies one is lying (at least in this > context and exchange), an act of attention, not omission, or mistake, and > when someone makes that claim they should back it up. But considering how > SMW defines itself on it's own extension page it clearly seems no > "falsehood" was stated. Yaron could be mistaken about the benefits of > Cargo, but absolutely no "falsehood" was stated. In two different spots the > issue of money is raised: "paying-clients naively trust statements you make > on these matters" and "when you'd rather not publicly confront that you're > messing with a cold hard cash issue" -- a very strange way to refer to > people just doing "due diligence". To paraphrase Shakespeare: the gentlemen > does protest too much. Why he does, I don't know, but he does owe Yaron an > apology for the personal attacks within his message. > > > > On Tue, Jan 13, 2015 at 12:23 PM, John McClure <jmccl...@hypergrove.com> > wrote: > >> Hi Yaron, >> I wish it were just a difference of opinion about what is good v bad, >> but the problem is that >> https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:Cargo/Cargo_and_Semantic_MediaWiki >> states or implies categorically that Cargo is EQUAL IF NOT BETTER than >> SMW, when Cargo's functionality is not comparable to SMW in any >> meaningful way. To me the "real issue" you mention is more the harm to >> the SMW community when falsehoods such as that claim stand without >> rebuttal, as paying-clients naively trust statements you make on these >> matters. >> >> So on a practical note I suggest that the page "Cargo and SMW" should be >> entitled "Cargo and SRF" and rewritten accordingly -- Cargo has zero >> relation to SMW, as we've discussed here. Cargo relates to SRF as >> a(nother) data-source for SRF routines, that's all. And surely you were >> instrumental when SRF was created as a separate extension in the first >> place specifically to accommodate a thing like Cargo, NOT as an >> under-handed way for a Cargo to then announce it "mimics" (a softer way >> to say "replace") SMW. >> >> And I dislike this breeezy dismissal as a "philosophical issue" -- when >> you'd rather not publicly confront that you're messing with a cold hard >> cash issue. >> thanks/john >> >> On 1/13/2015 11:16 AM, Yaron Koren wrote: >> > Okay... reading between the lines here, it's obvious that the real >> > issue is that you think triples = good, tables = bad. That's fine - >> > it's a valid opinion, and I'm sure there are other people on this >> > mailing list who share it. I just don't think we're going to break the >> > impasse on this one - that's a philosophical issue that's quite a bit >> > bigger than this discussion thread. >> > >> > On Tue, Jan 13, 2015 at 1:54 PM, John McClure <jmccl...@hypergrove.com >> > <mailto:jmccl...@hypergrove.com>> wrote: >> > >> > (shortened message body) >> > >> > On 1/13/2015 10:51 AM, John McClure wrote: >> >> Yaron, >> >> If I can generate an html table from data downloaded to browser >> >> cookies, have I "mimicked" SMW's full system, such as you state >> >> for Cargo? Not meant as a sarcastic question but rather to >> >> gently say to you that any (smw) application is greater than just >> >> the threshold question "can you output an html table"? >> >> >> >> So let's be clear: all that Cargo has done is to hookup the SRF >> >> codebase with 1970s SQL engines >> >> -- an accomplishment that has NOTHING to do with semantic >> >> mediawiki itself >> >> /john >> >> >> >> On 1/12/2015 5:35 PM, Yaron Koren wrote: >> >>> Hi, >> >>> >> >>> Well, Cargo is of course substantially different from SMW on the >> >>> back-end, but in terms of the user experience, there's >> >>> relatively little that you can do within the SMW system that you >> >>> can't do in Cargo. The big missing pieces, I would say, are the >> >>> GUI for Special:Ask, the #info function, and some of the result >> >>> formats. The "Property" namespace I wouldn't really call a >> >>> feature, and stuff like factboxes I don't find particularly >> >>> useful. I don't think I've seen a factbox on an SMW-based wiki >> >>> in a long time. >> >>> >> >>> By the way, I meant to respond to something before about editors >> >>> - I think among editors, too, the majority in either an >> >>> SMW-based or a Cargo-based system are not going to touch any of >> >>> the data structure wikitext. >> >>> >> >>> As for result formats - you can't have the same code running in >> >>> both extensions; I had to re-implement those formats for Cargo. >> >>> Thankfully it was pretty straightforward to do; I'd estimate >> >>> that the code for most of the current Cargo display formats is >> >>> about 1/3 the size of its SMW/SRF/etc. equivalent. >> >>> >> >>> -Yaron >> >>> >> >>> On Mon, Jan 12, 2015 at 8:10 PM, John McClure >> >>> <jmccl...@hypergrove.com <mailto:jmccl...@hypergrove.com>> wrote: >> >>> >> >>> Thanks for the link to >> >>> >> https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:Cargo/Cargo_and_Semantic_MediaWiki >> . >> >>> Reading it, Yaron, I have to say that I disagree that "the >> >>> Cargo extension was consciously designed to mimic the full >> >>> system of SMW". It does not -- and no system that claims to >> >>> rip out 90% of SMW functionality can make this claim; I have >> >>> specifically cited the areas in which Cargo does not mimic >> >>> SMW, and you do not disagree with any. So I do wish you >> >>> would remove this misleading (practically insulting) claim, >> >>> or at a minimum, change the words "full system" to >> >>> "technical interface". >> >>> >> >>> Second, what advice is there for an SRF format developer who >> >>> wishes to ensure their code works in both SMW and Cargo >> >>> environments? >> >>> thanks/j >> >>> >> >>> >> >>> /sometimes i experience a touch of turettes... apologies, i >> >>> live in the forest/ >> >>> >> > >> > >> > >> > -- >> > WikiWorks · MediaWiki Consulting · http://wikiworks.com >> >> -- >> /john >> 360.821.1880 >> skype:hypergrove >> >> /sometimes i experience a touch of turettes... apologies, i live in the >> forest/ >> >> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ >> New Year. New Location. New Benefits. 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