Topic Maps are an important component of a layered information and knowledge management architecture and their use in the enterprise continues to grow. In these systems Topic Maps play two roles. The first is a layer over disparate data sources allowing efficient and powerful navigation and knowledge transfer. The second is first-class business object, requiring the same sophisticated management that all business objects in the system do: life-cycle, configuration management, transaction semantics, etc.

This paper addresses some of the additional needs that Topic Maps as managed first-class business objects require. Most of these additional complexities are a result of Topic Maps' application to information objects. For example, the semantics of merging are complex and business process specific.

One typical approach of merging behavior is to create a new Topic Map that is completely independent of the source Topic Maps. This is insufficient for many use cases. The correct behavior may be to create dependencies of merged Topic Maps on their input, and respond to life-cycle changes in the input Topic Maps appropriately. This example and others are explored to more clearly frame the infrastructure and support needed to manage Topic Map business objects in the enterprise.