Subject: [urn] Some initial thoughts on draft-ietf-urnbis-rfc3188bis-nbn-urn-02

From: Bengt Neiss <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2012 10:42:40 +0000

Hello all..

Just some initial thoughts on the new text...

1.       In chapter 4.2. "Encoding Considerations...." the expressions "primary prefix" as well as "secondary prefix" are introduced. I think we need to rephrase this since "prefix" is the expression used otherwise in text. As it is written now there is a sentence that states that the NSS consists of three parts and then there is a list with four "parts"... (might be better as "primary part of prefix", " secondary part of prefix" which occurs in occurs in other places text). I think it should be similar to the text in "Declaration of syntactic structure..." on page 12 - 13.

2.       The sentence "Future NBN implementations SHOULD make the NBN string case insensitive as well". Is this a relevant statement?
Since it seems to be that the nbn_string may be case-sensitive depending on syntax applied locally (ie. already implemented) and URN:s are persistent the case-sensitivity of the nbn_string must always be taken into consideration...

3.       I think there is a need to work further on defining restrictions or evaluate the consequences of the current text. Will make a new post on some issues  later..

Regards

//Bengt

---------------------------------------------------------
Bengt Neiss
Kungl. Biblioteket / National Library of Sweden
Phone: +46 (0)10 709 35 41

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From: Alfred Hönes <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2012 15:37:08 +0100 (MEZ)

[[ speaking as co-author and document editor of the rfc3188bis I-D ]]

At 2012-01-24, Bengt Neiss wrote:

> 1.  In chapter 4.2. "Encoding Considerations...." the
> expressions "primary prefix" as well as "secondary prefix" are
> introduced.  I think we need to rephrase this since "prefix" is
> the expression used otherwise in text.  As it is written now there
> is a sentence that states that the NSS consists of three parts and
> then there is a list with four "parts"... (might be better as
> "primary part of prefix", "secondary part of prefix" which occurs
> in occurs in other places text).  I think it should be similar to
> the text in "Declaration of syntactic structure..." on page 12 - 13.

We will look into this and straighten up the text in the next
draft version.

(The related text has undergone a lot of changes due to the dropping
of the non-ISO 3166 prefixes, and admittedly the changes for this
effort and the effort to better align the text in the registration
template with the expanded prose have collided a bit.)

> 2.  The sentence "Future NBN implementations SHOULD make the NBN
> string case insensitive as well".  Is this a relevant statement?
> Since it seems to be that the nbn_string may be case-sensitive
> depending on syntax applied locally (ie.  already implemented) and
> URN:s are persistent the case-sensitivity of the nbn_string must
> always be taken into consideration...

The intent here was to refer to new usages of URN:NBNs, i.e.
national libraries and institutions that newly establish and/or
formalize NBNs and build national support services for URN:NBN
for their ISO 3166 URN:NBN prefix.

So there should not be backwards compatibility issues at the URN
level, but of course legacy NBN usage within the scope of the
future adoptors needs to be addressed, which might lead to a
legitimate exemption of the "SHOULD" quoted above.

Question to the list:
  Would you prefer to drop the quoted "SHOULD" recommendation ?

> 3.  I think there is a need to work further on defining
> restrictions or evaluate the consequences of the current text.
> Will make a new post on some issues later..

We are waiting for all kind of thoughts and text proposals!

> //Bengt

Kind regards,
  Alfred.

-- 

+------------------------+--------------------------------------------+
| TR-Sys Alfred Hoenes   |  Alfred Hoenes   Dipl.-Math., Dipl.-Phys.  |
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From: Juha Hakala <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2012 08:02:36 +0200

Hello Bengt, Alfred & all,

>> restrictions or evaluate the consequences of the current text.

Definitely!

> We are waiting for all kind of thoughts and text proposals!

I agree that there is a need to evaluate the present draft and carefully 
consider the impact it will have on NBN assignment and use. The same 
applies to the ISBN namespace registration, but that document is less 
challenging to write since the ISBN system is specified in great detail 
in the ISO standard 2108:2005 and related guidelines.

On the level of the URN system as a whole, there shall not be many 
restrictions, since at the top level we must allow anything that any 
namespace might justifiably require in the future. We have spent some 
time on the list to find the limits of acceptability. URNs certainly do 
not need to be resolvable, and I have understood that there will be no 
absolute requirement for persistence either because, among other things, 
URNs can be assigned to things which are not persistent per se.

Whether the identifier must be more persistent than the identified 
object itself is of course an interesting question which we do not need 
to solve (I hope).

But URN namespaces can (and many will) specify more detailed rules. The 
identifier system itself may be the basis for this; for instance, 
bibliographic identifiers tend to be persistent and there is a good 
chance that they will remain actionable for quite some time.

NBN will pose a challenge in this respect since it is not a single 
identifier system but a set of them, assigned primarily by the national 
libraries and their peers. Requirements specified in the namespace 
registration may, in the worst case, become counterproductive if we do 
not foresee correctly the ways in which NBNs will be used in the future. 
In the end of the day, feedback from the current and potential future 
users of NBNs is the best guarantee that the NBN namespace registration 
will make sense even five years from now.

So, I look forward to text proposals from Bengt and other current and 
potential user of NBNs. The more people contribute to the content, the 
better.

Best regards,

Juha

-- 

  Juha Hakala
  Senior advisor, standardisation and IT

  The National Library of Finland
  P.O.Box 15 (Unioninkatu 36, room 503), FIN-00014 Helsinki University
  Email [email-masked], tel +358 50 382 7678