[MOBY-dev] Updating vs generating RDF

[Pieter Neerincx]

Hi Moby developers,

I was wondering if one of you can point me to an easy way to update  
the RDF for an already registered moby service?

Generating the RDF the first time was easy. I used dashboard and  
there's also an online web form linked from the Biomoby website. But I  
cannot figure out how to update the RDF. The documentation tells me I  
have to update and then either call the RDF agent or simply wait for  
the next pass. The latter is easy, but I don't seem to be able to  
generate updated RDF for my service with the dashboard. When I modify  
my service I can save the service registration XML without  
registering, but I cannot save the RDF. The only way the RDF is  
generated and saved is  to click the register service button, but that  
one fails because the service is already registered. Clicking  
unregister service first to reregister the updated version will fail  
of course too as you cannot unregister a service that was registered  
with an RDF signature URL. Likewise the online form the generate the  
RDF cannot be used, because it only works for existing services.

I looked at the RDF to update it manually. I can patch most of it  
manually, but there are Description tags like this:

	<rdf:Description rdf:about="http://biomoby.org/RESOURCES/MOBY-S/ServiceInstances/e0578ca78558ba81463c3e9f59412c9b 
">

Where do those numbers at the end of the rdf:about attribute value  
come from?

As far as I can figure out the only way to get my service RDF updated  
is to remove the RDF, call the agent to unregister the service and  
then to re-register a new one, but I was hoping to find a more elegant  
approach :)....

Cheers,

Pi