Skip to main content

Building the Semantic Web on XML

01 January 2002

New Image

The semantic discontinuity between World-Wide languages (XML, XML Schema, XPath, ...) and Semantic Web languages (RDF(S) and DAML+OIL) forms a serious barrier for the stated goals of the Semantic Web. This discontinuity results from a difference in modeling foundations between XML and logics. We propose to eliminate that discontinuity by creating a common semantic foundation for both the World-Wide Web and the Semantic Web, taking ideas from both. The common foundation results in essentially no change to XML, and only minor changes to RDF. But it allows the Semantic Web to get closer to its goal of describing the semantics of the World Wide Web. Other Semantic Web languages (including RDFS and DAML+OIL) are considerably changed because of this common foundation.