From: devinkouts_at_earthlink.net
Date: Thu Jan 25 2001 - 16:39:22 CET
Received: (from mdom_at_localhost) by karto.ethz.ch (8.9.3/8.9.3/SuSE Linux 8.9.3-0.1) id QAA17079 for cavexml-outgoing; Thu, 25 Jan 2001 16:37:28 +0100 Received: from [209.70.170.131] (brick.cist.saic.com [209.70.170.131]) by karto.ethz.ch (8.9.3/8.9.3/SuSE Linux 8.9.3-0.1) with SMTP id QAA17075 for <cavexml_at_cartography.ch>; Thu, 25 Jan 2001 16:37:27 +0100 From: devinkouts_at_earthlink.net Received: from cist.saic.com by [209.70.170.131] via smtpd (for karto.ethz.ch [129.132.127.159]) with SMTP; 25 Jan 2001 15:37:31 UT Received: from earthlink.net (unverified [10.43.39.246]) by exmail.cist.saic.com (EMWAC SMTPRS 0.83) with SMTP id <B0000711692_at_exmail.cist.saic.com>; Thu, 25 Jan 2001 10:38:30 -0500 Message-ID: <3A7048AA.AB0A9326@earthlink.net> Date: Thu, 25 Jan 2001 10:39:22 -0500 X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.6 [en] (WinNT; U) X-Accept-Language: en To: cavexml_at_cartography.ch Subject: CaveXML>ERD Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-cavexml_at_karto.baug.ethz.ch Precedence: bulk Reply-To: cavexml_at_cartography.ch
Andreas had put a todo on his task list (
http://www.karto.ethz.ch/~an/caving/cavexml/tasks.html ) that reads -
"Draw up a survey and mapping ERD" (Entity Relationship Diagram).
After watching the gyrations we've gone through these last couple days
(not unproductive by any means) and doing a little further poking into
the question of Elements vs. Attributes. I'm seeing that Data
Normalization (you know 1NF, 2NF, 3NF, BNF, etc.) would be a valuable
tool that could help us all get onto a single page for discussion.
While it's good to kick around ideas about how to structure the CaveXML
file, we are in a sense putting the cart before the horse. Data
Normalization techniques are appropriate to the exercise of creating an
XML file format.
But, in order to do Data Normalization, you need to have in place a good
set of, you guessed it, Entity Relationship Diagrams. And before we do
ERD's we must establish (another todo on Andreas' list) the range of
fields which we need to consider in a survey data transfer.
For the time being, we might want to focus on submission of data element
names - accompanied by a definition, so we can develop a working list of
what will eventually become (or not become) part of the CaveXML formats.
DSK
-- Devin Kouts Caver Systems Engineer www.psc-cavers.org
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Wed Feb 14 2001 - 00:03:53 CET