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Re: [obix] The Contract List is Dead, Long live the Contract Element! - for WD41 - now WD42 update - UML diagram

From
William Cox <>
Date
2015-04-30T00:30:07+00:00
ID
Thread
Re: [obix] The Contract List is Dead, Long live the Contract Element! - for WD41 - now WD42 update - UML diagram
I've attached the completed UML diagram based on Toby's schema for
    WD41.

    

    I will finish up a new WD after dinner (yes, it's late dinner) and
    post tonight.

    

    Some issues with the UML and wd41 schema:

    

    (1) Most items are XSD atttributes, hence optional by default (is
    there XSD cardinality for attributes? not sure).  This leads to some
    strange things:

        Bool, for example: the value is optional (val [0..1') but is
    initialized to false. Likewise Real val = 0 but is optional

        Many instances (artifacts) would conform with nothing at all in
    them except the type name. Seems odd.

        

    (2) some type names are lower case in the schema. That means that
    Obj.status is of type status ("status: status = ok" - showing
    initial value).

    

    (3) related: contract is lower case, but it might well be a global
    element or attribute of ContractType (not defined). Probably
    compatibility.

    

    (4) in List, the initial value for of is "OBIX:obj".  First, I think
    that that's the namespace identifier in the schema, and it should be
    "obix:obj" as in earlier schema drafts. Second, why is obj lower
    case? Again conflates the names for global attributes with type
    names.  Is this another "distinguished value" such as "Nil"?

    

    (5) I think that leaving the UML stereotypes for XSDattribute and
    XSDelement is very useful to the reader.  In the previous version
    I'd manually deleted them.

    

    Comments?

    

    Working along, will publish tonight.

    

    Thanks!

    

    bill

    --

    
William Cox 

    
Email:  

    
Web: http://www.CoxSoftwareArchitects.com 

    
+1 862 485 3696 mobile

    

    

    

    

    

    
On 4/29/15 4:28 PM, William Cox wrote:

    

    
      
      Craig -

      

      Thanks for the update. I think the most productive path forward is
      for me to clean up the diagram (attached to my earlier email),
      insert in a new WD42, and make the touchups needed to have the
      updated "contract" definition make sense.

      

      I'll do that and post tonight; no need for you to work on the next
      WD.

      

      Toby, does that work?

      

      BTW the draft schema was directly reverse-engineered into the
      diagram, and I think is much more clear. I'm going to leave the
      XSDattribute/XSDelement stereotypes in the UML as it'll be more
      clear to those using XML.

      

      Thanks!

      

      bill

      --

      

        
        
        
        
        
        
        
William Cox 

        
Email:  

        
Web: http://www.CoxSoftwareArchitects.com 

        
+1 862 485 3696 mobile

        

        

      

      

      

      
On 4/29/15 12:39 PM, Gemmill, Craig
        wrote:

      

      
        
        
        
        
        

          
I apologize,
              I have not been able to get to the WD42 yet.  If you want
              to go ahead with a discussion on WD41 tomorrow, that would
              be fine.  I’m not sure we’ve discussed everything that we
              had on the queue last week anyway.  I hope to at least be
              able to go over WD41 to be prepared for a discussion, but
              it would be tonight before I got to it.

          
 

          
I believe Nil
              & list of URIs was in 1.0, I had not really changed
              any of that behavior, IIRC.

          
 

          
I’m still not
              totally sure the contract stuff is right though.

          
 

          
 

          
 

          

            

              
From:
                  William Cox [mailto:]
                  

                  Sent: Wednesday, April 29, 2015 11:03 AM

                  To: ;
                  Gemmill, Craig

                  Subject: Re: [obix] The Contract List is Dead,
                  Long live the Contract Element! - for WD41

            

          

          
 

          
Craig--

            

            I've attached the WD40 diagram dated 20150422 and a work in
            progress on WD41.

            

            Should I touch up the document now that we've moved toward
            resolution? Do we need further discussion first?

          

            

              Does this all work for you? I'm not sure what the 1.0
              behavior is; was the list-of-URIs and Nil a 1.1
              innovation? Was it in 1.0 or 1.0 extensions?

              

              Here's a partial update to the UML - from
              reverse-engineering the WD41 schema. Due to oddities in
              the Enterprise Architect UML tool I have to do some hand
              updates to the attributes - for example, in Op the
              attributes will be 

              

                  in: contract

                  out: contract 

              

              The initialization to Nil in the WD41 XSD is not yet
              reflected - again has to be manual.

              

              The terminology is

              

              Contract - The relevant agreement for a specific purpose,
              e.g., for Feed "in" and "of" are of type Contract. The XSD
              type is String.  The string contains one or more
              URIs separated by spaces. If the initial URI is the string
              "Nil" the Contract is treated as empty.  The initial URI
              element has special meaning - see section XYZ.

              

              Thanks!

              

              bill

              --

            
William Cox 

            
Email:   

            
Web:  http://www.CoxSoftwareArchitects.com 

            
+1 862 485 3696 mobile

            
 

            

              
On 4/26/15 6:56 PM, Toby Considine
                wrote:

            

            
              
Much of the conversation since
                February has been around the confusing and inconsistent
                use of Contract and ContractList. This is compounded by
                the “is” and the “of” which are “formatted as a contract
                list”

              
 

              
As I can best summarize the
                conclusions:

              
 

              
A ContractElement is an URI.

              
A contract is a string consisting of
                0-to-many space delimited ContractElements. 

              
If a Contract consists of 0 (zero)
                ContractElements, then by convention it is represented
                with the reserved string “nil”

              
 

              
There is some language that suggests
                that the first contract element in a contract has some
                sort of special or primary value, but it is not yet
                clear to me precisely what this means.

              
 

              
I believe that this language, and
                this description, if applied across all the areas of the
                specification document that use the term “Contract” will
                remove the last inconsistencies in the specification.

              
 

              
The Schema WD41, recently uploaded,
                reflects this change.

              
 

              
tc

              

                   

              
“The

                      single biggest problem in communication is the
                      illusion that it has taken place.” 

              
– George
                    Bernard Shaw.

              

                   

              
                
                  

                    
                      
Toby

                          Considine

                          TC9, Inc.

                      


                          Phone: (919)619-2104

                      
http://www.tc9.com
                        

                    
                    
                      
  

                    
                    
                      
Chair,

                          OASIS OBIX Technical Committee

                      
Chair,

                          OASIS WS-Calendar Technical Committee

                      
Editor,

                          OASIS Energy Market Information Exchange
                          (EMIX) Editor, OASIS Energy Interoperation

                          blog: http://www.NewDaedalus.com 
                        

                    
                  

                
              
              
 

              
 

            
            
 

          

        

      
      

    
    

  

Attachment:
Obix Obj and Subclasses.png

Description: PNG image
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