What's New

Friday 27th February 2004

• Added a new document on validating ZeeRex Records, including the stable URLs and FPIs for various versions of the ZeeRex specification, and guidance for establishing a link between a ZeeRex record and the appropriate version of the DTD.

Thursday 26th February 2004

Lots of new material, all from Rob.

• version 2.0 [changes] of the ZeeRex DTD - a major release coinciding with the release of version 1.1 of the SRW protocol in which it plays such a major role.
• Major updates to The ZeeRex DTD Commentary describing the modified structure of version 2.0.
• Two new samples exemplifying the 2.0 specifications: records describing the SRW version and the Z39.50 version of the database for the Legend of the Five Rings card game.
• Total rewrite (much shorter now!) of the page on using ZeeRex with SRW. Much less now needs to be said, as the new specifications are designed with Z39.50 and SRW equally in mind rather than (as before) being primarily a Z39.50 specification that can also be used to describe SRW.

Friday 6th June 2003

• Released version 1.9 [changes] of the ZeeRex DTD - a simple bugfix release.

Friday 16th May 2003

It's been a looong time ...

• Upgraded The ZeeRex DTD Commentary to a new version provided by Rob. This includes much more description of how ZeeRex is to be used in SRW, and so perhaps obsoletes the separate section on that subject.

Wednesday 29th January 2002

• Added Rob Sanderson's very cool XSLT stylesheet for transforming ZeeRex records into web forms that query databases via SRW.

  Some example uses are linked from the Miscellaneous area.

Thursday 24th October 2002

• Added a links page.
• Added an applications page, initially just describing the Mersey Libraries project.

Tuesday 1st October 2002

• Made various bug-fix changes to version 1.8 of the ZeeRex DTD and its changes file, with Rob's agreement. In theory, I should have left 1.8 as immutable and published 1.9 instead, but since the original 1.8 was actually syntactically invalid, it's obvious that no-one was using it, so I've gone for the lightweight approach.

Sunday 15th September 2002

• Added versions 1.7 [changes] and 1.8 [changes] of the ZeeRex DTD (now so-named rather than being called the Explain-- DTD as previous versions were).

Friday 30th August 2002

• Added a note about how to find all the records in a ZeeRex database to the searching overview.

Wednesday 28th August 2002

• Careful editorial reworking of the overview document to fix a few typos, clarify one or two ambiguities and fix up some links that have moved since it was written. I'm really pleased with the result. We should try to get it published somewhere as a ``white paper''.

Sunday 28th April 2002

• Do the incredibly dull, stultifyingly boring, execrably monotonous yet fiendishly error-prone task of changing the name ``Explain--'' to ``ZeeRex'' everywhere that change is appropriate, but nowhere that it isn't. I just can't begin to tell you how much I'm enjoying this. Or - no, wait! I can: ``not at all''.

Thursday 11th April 2002

• Added Rob's presentatation to the April 2002 ZIG meeting.

Wednesday 3rd April 2002

• Belatedly added version 1.6 of the Explain-- DTD, and its changes file and the automatically generated equivalent XML DTD and XML Schema.
• Moved what was previously called the Explain-- DTD Commentary to a new name, The Explain-- Reference Guide, which more accurately reflects its contents.
• Added Rob's new, more discursive Explain-- DTD Commentary. I have not proof-read this at all, nor edited beyond the header and trailer tweaks necessary for it to fit in with the rest of the site, so blame Rob for any mistakes! :-)

Thursday 28th March 2002

• Add a description of when and how to extend the record.
• Added version 1.5 of the Explain-- DTD, and its changes file and the automatically generated equivalent XML DTD and XML Schema.
• Updated The Explain-- DTD Commentary to reflect version 1.5 of the DTD.
• Added Rob's new sample Explain-- record conforming to version 1.5 (current) of the DTD.
• Added the new attribute access point to The Explain-- Attribute Set in place of the half-specified and under-powered accessPoint attribute.
• Wrote the main document about Searching Explain-- Databases, indicating which access points form the utility and cross-domain sets should be supported, and describing how proximity may be used to search for attribute combinations.

Wednesday 27th March 2002

• Added lots of prose to the previously skeletal Overview of Explain--.
• Added references to ISO 8601 (date format) to the relevant section of The Explain-- DTD Commentary.

Tuesday 26th March 2002

• Added the first, embryonic version of An Overview of Explain--.

Monday 25th March 2002

• Added version 1.4 of the Explain-- DTD, and its changes file and the automatically generated equivalent XML DTD and XML Schema.
• Moved the previous Explain-- DTD Commentary document to a new name, The Explain-- DTD FAQ, which more accurately reflects its contents.
• Added a new and much improved The Explain-- DTD Commentary, supplied by Rob, which mirrors the structure of an Explain-- record, commenting on some of the less obvious features.

Friday 22nd March 2002

• Created a new area for specifications to do with searching.
• Moved The Explain-- Attribute Set from its old location to a new location in the searching area.
• Added access point 6 (protocol) to The Explain-- Attribute Set.
• Added embryonic access point 7 (accessPoint) to The Explain-- Attribute Set, but it still needs to be defined.
• Generalised access point 1 from the old thisServer, which ignored its term, to explainAdmin, which may take one of a set of defined terms, including thisServer.
• Added another term, authorised to the list of those that may be used with the explainAdmin access point.
• Added an embryonic form of The Explain-- DTD Commentary.

Wednesday 13th March 2002

• Added Rob's new sample Explain-- record conforming to version 1.3 (current) of the DTD.

Tuesday 12th March 2002

It's my birthday today!

• Added Using Explain-- with SRW.
• Added version 1.3 of the Explain-- DTD, and its changes file and the automatically generated equivalent XML DTD and XML Schema.
• Added a first stab at The Explain-- Attribute Set.

Saturday 9th March 2002

• Added version 1.2 of the Explain-- DTD, and its changes file.
• Added automatically generated XLM DTD and XML Schema formats of each version of the SGML DTD.

Thursday 7th March 2002

• Added version 1.1 of the Explain-- DTD, and its changes file.

Wednesday 6th March 2002

• Added the DTD page.
• Added the Sample Documents page.
• Added the Search page.

Thursday 28th February 2002

• First public version of this site.