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Sent on from Pat Harris at NISO: a new way to reference both documents and
classification schemes on the web.



David


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NISO-Sponsored INFO URI Scheme is Information Gateway to the Web
Publishing and Library Communities Join Forces to Facilitate and Expedite
Representation of Standard Identifiers such as Library of Congress Control
Numbers on the Web

Bethesda, MD - January 14, 2004 - Working under the auspices of the National
Information Standards Organization (NISO), a joint task force of the
publishing and library communities has developed and published a Uniform
Resource Identifier (URI) scheme aimed at the identification of information
assets.  Information assets should be interpreted rather broadly to include,
for example, documents and terms from classification schemes.  The INFO URI
scheme is a consistent and reliable way to represent and reference such
standard identifiers as Dewey Decimal Classifications on the Web so that
these identifiers can be "read" and understood by Web applications.  Led by
four NISO members and associates-Los Alamos National Laboratory, Online
Computer Library Center (OCLC), Elsevier, and Manifest Solutions-the
initiative builds on earlier consultations with representatives from the
World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) and the Internet Engineering Task Force
(IETF). An Internet-Draft for the INFO URI scheme was first published Sept.
25th, 2003 and a revision published Dec. 5th, 2003 (see
<http://www.ietf.org/internet-drafts/draft-vandesompel-info-uri-01.txt>).*

Herbert Van de Sompel, Digital Library Research & Prototyping at the Los
Alamos National Laboratory's Research Library, stated, "A good example of
the problem that the INFO URI scheme solves involves PubMed identifiers:
unique numbers assigned to records in the PubMed database maintained by the
National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) of the National Library
of Medicine.  PubMed identifiers originated prior to the Web, so they are
not URIs. As such they do not exist naturally in the Web infrastructure
because the Web only recognizes URIs as a means to identify information
resources.  So Web applications cannot use PubMed identifiers, and hence
cannot reference PubMed records that are identified by them.  The solution
is to turn PubMed identifiers into URIs.  The INFO Registry enables the
registration of public namespaces of standard identifiers; NCBI registered
its PubMed identifier namespace under the INFO Registry-their namespace is
pmid-so we can now talk about the record with the PubMed identifier
'12376099' in URI terms as <info:pmid/12376099>."



"The goal of INFO is to act as a bridging mechanism to the Web by providing
a lightweight means for registering public namespaces used for the
identification of information assets," said Tony Hammond, Advanced
Technology Group at Elsevier, a world-leading publisher of scientific,
technical and medical information products and services.  "We see INFO as an
enabling technology for the library, publishing and media communities-a way
to facilitate and speed the growth of the Web as a truly global information
place beyond a basic document repository. The Library of Congress, the
National Library of Medicine, and NASA are among those organizations that
have already registered public namespaces with the INFO Registry."

"There are different ways to represent these identifiers on the Web,"
explained Pat Harris, NISO's Executive Director, "but the INFO URI scheme
really simplifies matters. As a Web user, you aren't likely to see the
scheme in action on your screen-for example, <info:lccn/2002022641>, because
it's an under-the-hood way of communicating the identity of an information
asset to a Web application."





The INFO Registry is now available online at <http://info-uri.info/> for
receiving new registrations. This Registry contains all the information
needed by Web applications to make use of INFO namespaces. Each Registry
entry defines the namespace, the syntax, and normalization rules for the
representing INFO identifiers as URIs, and gives full contact information
for the namespace authority for that entry. Moreover, the INFO Registry is
readable by both humans and machines alike.



For more information about the INFO URI scheme, see the FAQ at

< http://info-uri.info/registry/docs/misc/faq.html >.


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About NISO
NISO, a non-profit association accredited by the American National Standards
Institute (ANSI), identifies, develops, maintains, and publishes technical
standards to manage information in our changing and ever-more digital
environment. NISO standards apply both traditional and new technologies to
the full range of information-related needs, including retrieval,
re-purposing, storage, metadata, and preservation. www.niso.org

Press Contact: Maryann Karinch ([log in to unmask]), T:  970-577-8500

* Both Uniform Resource Locators (URLs) and Uniform Resource Names (URNs)
are types of URIs.  While URLs are locators, or addresses, on the Web, URNs
are names on the Web.  The INFO URI scheme is a special type of URN which
complements regular URNs but is designed to be simpler and more convenient
both to manage and to use.

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Pat Harris
Executive Director
National Information Standards Organization (NISO)
4733 Bethesda Avenue, Suite 300
Bethesda, MD 20814 USA
T: 301-654-2512 ** Mobile: 202-258-3296
Fax: 301-654-1721
Email: [log in to unmask]
url: http://www.niso.org