Why is it so hard to lean topicmaps?
Categorised under: Information architecture, XML
Peter Van Dijck has posted a blog entry about how hard it is to learn topicmaps. To quote:
So when you’re interested in topicmaps, you read the specs or one of these tutorials, and unless you’re familiar with data models and a bunch of advanced metadata concepts (reification anyone?), it’s gonna blow your head. Many people give up right there.
The distance between the topicmap model and a real life application seems larger than the distance between the relational database model and a real life application.
I think Peter has definitely hit the key issue with topic maps, and it certainly matches my personal experience.
James Robertson is the Managing Director of 