UK and European project commitments have prevented me from engaging with
this debate as closely as I would have wished, for which my apologies.
Although I was a willing party to the Information Schema work currently
under way, I am concerned that we are heading towards a compromise that
satisfies no one. We've all heard the old joke: "What is a camel? It is
a horse designed by committee". We need a horse not a camel as a result
of what we are doing now.
I am further concerned that we are developing sophisticated solutions to problems we have not properly defined and which are not part of the remit for TAP V1.0. In case I didn't make it clear in my opening remarks at the DAL TAP session in Cambridge, I believe we are not making progress with TAP because we do not share a common understanding of the problems we are trying to address or the pressures each project faces. Therefore we MUST agree Use Cases before we attempt to deliver complex solutions to ill formed requirements. However, I do believe enough basic requirements for TAP V1.0 are known (see below) and that we have a duty to the IVOA to get TAP V1.0 agreed ASAP.
Going back to the "camel" above, I do not see why we are trying to fit an IS into a VOTable when it seems clear to me that we need a mechanism to obtain basic metadata (both for service and content) AND a device for accessing the detailed metadata that an IS (for example) would provide. The only question is one of timing. Although this has at various times been discussed within the context of VOSI, it is perfectly acceptable for TAP to specify both an IS (or similar) approach and a simple metadata approach to the question of metadata provision _if_ the Use Cases so dictate. Finally, it was made abundantly clear to us in Beijing - and it remains the case - that the priority for TAP V1.0 is to define how we handle ADQL querying. Period. No arguments.
I therefore propose that we approach TAP in incremental steps starting with the most basic requirements and working upwards from there. I will publish a roadmap for TAP as soon as I can, but the starting point in TAP V1.0 has to be:
This is the level of detail we need to be examining for TAP V1.0. I plan to quickly follow TAP V1.0 with a V1.1 which includes capabilities that match the Use Cases that we *must* define. I am NOT willing to preside over another 18 months of circular debate whilst the rest of the IVOA looks on bemused.
Keith.
-- Keith Noddle Phone: +44 (0)116 223 1894 AstroGrid Project manager Fax: +44 (0)116 252 3311 Dept of Physics & Astronomy Mobile: +44 (0)7721 926 461 University of Leicester Email: ktn-at-star.le.ac.uk Leicester, UK LE1 7RH Web: http://www.astrogrid.orgReceived on 2007-10-10Z15:11:24