My OpenURL High Horse (was RE: [XML4Lib] ILS system architectures)

[Young,Jeff (OR)]

At the risk of beating a dead high horse, I find that I have more to say
about this.

> Alexander Johannesen wrote:
> 
> > Didn't the libraries used to be early adopters and innovators? What 
> > happened? OCLC stuff is not cutting edge. Even stuff talked 
> about as 
> > cutting-edge certainly isn't. What's the latest hype that 
> came up? A 
> > structured Wiki with an integrated DB? Just the thing academic 
> > librarians would think of but hardly what is desperately 
> needed; open, 
> > well-crafted and non-ambigious semantically-rich scemas that are 
> > simple to support, use and extend.

My first paragraph is a rant. Feel free to skip it. Starting with the
second paragraph, though, I think there might be fodder for discussion
on this group.

I resent being the poster child of OCLC's irrelevance, not to mention
the irrelevance of "academic librarians" in general. It would be easy
for me to dismiss this as coming from a clueless "dittohead", but the
terrible truth is that WikiD is as subtle and complex as it is obvious
and trivial. There are no more than a handful of people within OCLC who
appreciate its potential and limitations, and fewer still outside of
OCLC. The question becomes, can WikiD be justified or is it yet another
research project destined for the archives?

The answer, I think, is bound up in the value of OpenURL 1.0. After all,
WikiD is nothing more than an OpenURL 1.0 resolver with a wiki-style
user interface. How many people in this group understand and appreciate
OpenURL 1.0? If you see it as the best thing since sliced bread the way
I do, then help me figure out how to explain it to others. If you think
it is worthless, I would honestly love to hear why.

The truth is, I share Alexander's frustration with schemas. The
difference is, I don't see salvation coming from that direction. We can
all benefit from better schemas, but that steep and rocky path is more
than I can endure. Standard protocols, OTOH, have been very fruitful in
my experience. Maybe I have put too much faith in OpenURLs, but as I see
it the future of it looks boundless.

Jeff