Welcome, and some comments (was RE: [rdfweb-dev] hey)

[Marc Canter]

Oooops - sorry again for sounding rude.

I AM here to help.  That's why I'm here.

My contribution (besides the open source weboutliner tool we have
(http://demo.weboutliner.com/weboutliner ) can be to see things from the
end-users perspective.

Later today I will try (for the third time) to install SVG on my machine
- and attempt to walk through a typical day in the life of a FOAF meme.
By that I mean:

	- new user joins - by creating a FOAF file and posting it
somewhere
		- #1 perspective #1 - there doesn’t seem to be ONE way
to structure the URL.  Am I wrong about that? 
		- wouldn’t having ONE way to do a URL be easier-simpler
- or am I being naïve?

	- embeds blog with FOAF pointer
		- what's the right place to do this? The Home/Blog page?
Or the 'About me' page?   Or both?
		- I find it frustrating using FOAf Explorer to select
the bookmarklet and get nothing - from RDF nerd pages  which I KNOW have
FOAF in there - somewhere.
		- Guidance and best practices suggestions could help
here.

	- make friends with other FOAF heads
		- now that Morten has provided that functionality - I
can say "I'm getting there"
		- I'm excited about the upcoming FOAF-a-matic mark2 -
and not just because my name is Marc Canter
		- Haven't found example of a two level friend network
yet.....
		- I know that's supposed to happen dynamically - but
sure two, trhe, four degrees could/should get embedded in a file - no?

	- THEN I can sit down and design how WE'RE going to use
FOAF.....

I'm also excited about trying out the import/export from eCademy - and
seeing if any of this works with TypePad right now.

===================
further apologizes below.......
===================

-----Original Message-----
From: Leigh Dodds [mailto:ldodds at ingenta.com] 
Sent: Thursday, July 03, 2003 7:46 AM
To: Marc Canter; rdfweb-dev at vapours.rdfweb.org
Subject: RE: Welcome, and some comments (was RE: [rdfweb-dev] hey)

Marc,

The main thing that troubles me about your email is that you seem have 
this impression that we're all here with our head in the sands ignoring 
the difficulties that users are having with FOAF.

And thats not the case at all.

>>>>>>>>>>>>OK - I'm grokking that now - sorry!

We're actively working to improve the FOAF documentation and tools 
all the time. Thanks to volunteer efforts the FOAF-a-Matic is now
available 
in 8 languages (and I'm looking for more). I count that as a great step
forward as 
it opens FOAF up to a vast amount of new users. At the time of writing
that tool is 
the 1st Google hit for a search of "FOAF"; pretty hard to miss I'd say.

>>>>>>>>>>>  Andiamo.  Avanti Populo!

Dan is improving the weblog all the time, and the Wiki is being
restructured 
to improve the documentation. W.r.t support this community is about as 
"wired" as it could be with a weblog, wiki, mailing list, IRC and even
the 
occasional F2F meeting. Again we're all here to help.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>  Coolio.

Jay's problems, which he largely attributes to cut-and-paste errors when

cribbing from other peoples FOAF documents, are unfortunate but the 
good news is is that he was able to find help pretty quickly. Yes, the 
creation tools should support more of the FOAF vocabulary than they do 
now, but surely its far better to have them supporting the core stable 
set of FOAF properties than rushing to add everything in one go? Jays 
overall impression was a positive one.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>  I'm in favor of having stable features delineated - so I
know what I can rely upon.

We've begun discussing how to label the stable elements in FOAF so that 
can be clearly passed on to both users, and more importantly, tool
creators.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>  Wiki page of proposed 'stable' features?

Re: interop between the different tools; where do you think that there
are 
break downs between FOAF-a-Matic, FOAF Explorer and FOAFnaut? If 
you're (or somewhere you're linked with is) on the FOAFBulletinBoard
then FOAFnaut 
should pick you up. If you have FOAF autodiscovery set up then
FOAFExplorer can 
read your FOAF with the bookmarklet. If the instructions for what to do
with the FOAF 
you generate with the FOAF-a-Matic aren't clear enough then _please_ let
me know 
the problem areas and I'll improve it.

>>>>>>>>>>>> within 12 hours..........

So I think everything you asked for is currently in-progress already. If
its not 
happening fast enough then perhaps you can pitch in and help out? The 
Wiki is open for everyone to edit, so why not help bring the
documentation 
quality up a notch by wading in there?

>>>>>>>>>>>>>  Rather than documentation - I think what's in order are
called 'usage scenarios'.  Specific step by step tutorials - taking no
buzzwords, previous knowledge or insider poop - for granted.  Which can
be utilized as documentation, training or marketing purposes.

================================================

Cheers,

L. (speaking only for himself)

p.s. I find it amusing that you use Typepad as an example of why FOAF
needs 
commercial support, when that product is a service piggy-backing off an 
open source tool thats has benefited greatly from community involvement 
and development. 


>>>>>>>>>>  But wait!  The issue is not whether or not TypePad comes
from open source or not - or whether it's for free or only available as
a commercial product.  The issue is leadership, standards and freezing
some format - that you may or may not like.

>>>>>>>>>>  I don’t have the perspective or knowledge to formulate an
opinion about TypePad and FOAF. But I can tell yah from an end-users
MARKET perspective - that the WAY TypePad uses FOAF - will be a taste in
people's mouths that they'll never forget.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>  So I wasn't being critical in any way - just being
politically experienced.  The world of standards building is more than
where the bits are.  It's about getting people to use something.  So if
X amount of people are using FOAF as Y - then Z might not matter - which
would (or might) bum you gals and guys out.  That's all.

I'm just a 'call to action' kind of guy. No insult intended.

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