XML Topic Maps: Creating and Using Topic Maps for the Web

Summary

With the advent of the Web, the amount of easily available information has exploded. Methodologies such as RDF and topic maps were developed because of the need to separate the good information from all the junk.

The XTM specification has gathered a great deal of support, as discussed in Chapter 4. Early adopters have shown that it is indeed a useful specification and have also identified areas in which it can be extended or improved. One of the signs of the true power of topic maps is that many of the extensions can be accomplished using the topic maps paradigm.

The ability to construct semantic networks from topic maps provides an exciting possibility of having a standard by which knowledge can be stored and interchanged. In the past, ...