RE: Glossary of terms relating to thesauri and faceted classifica tion

Hi Tom, all,

> I'm not so sure...  The draft DCMI Abstract Model [1] defines
> "term" to be "The generic name for a property..., vocabulary
> encoding scheme, syntax encoding scheme, or concept taken from
> a controlled vocabulary (concept space)".  Then it defines
> "term URI" as "The generic name for a URI reference that
> identifies a term".  In other words, it makes a distinction
> between a modeling entity and the identifier for that modeling
> entity.

It occurs to me that 'concept space' might be a better name for what SKOS
Core currently calls a 'concept scheme'.  Any thoughts on this?

Just to mention this again, when I originally wrote about the 'terms of the
SKOS Core vocabulary' in the guide and the spec I was following the DCMI
conventions as Tom describes above.  This does seem to be at odds with the
RDF conventions described below - which suggests to me that we should look
for (or usurp :) some new vocabulary for talking about our RDF thingies.

Cheers,

Al.


> 
> In contrast, the definitions of "RDF term" in RDF Semantics
> and the SPARQL draft imply that the identifier _is_ the
> modeling entity (not an identifier _for_ the modeling entity).
> What you are saying, then, implies to me that an "RDF term"
> (a URI) is not quite the same as a "DCMI term" (a conceptual
> entity identified by a URI).
> 
> What, then, is a term in the SKOS vocabulary?  Reading on...:
> 
> > The SKOS vocabulary then, is a set of such entities...
> 
> Do you mean to say that a SKOS vocabulary is a set of URIs?
> 
> Would this mean that the DCMI use of "term" is at odds with
> the RDF/SKOS use of "term"??
> 
> >                                     Since RDF uses URIs as 
> a way to identify
> > the things it relates, it is an easy shorthand in many 
> cases to consider that
> > the URIs are themselves the things.
> 
> Or is the RDF/SPARQL/SKOS way of putting things simply an
> example of such a shorthand?  And that in reality, an RDF
> vocabulary really _is_ a set of terms identified by URIs.
> Assure me this is the case and I will provide you beer by
> the case!
> 
> >                                     In many cases the 
> distinction doesn't
> > matter, but in some it does.
> 
> Or does it even really matter?  Convince me that it really,
> really does not matter and I will provide two cases!  :)
> 
> Tom
> 
> [1] http://dublincore.org/documents/abstract-model/
> 
> -- 
> Dr. Thomas Baker                        Thomas.Baker@izb.fraunhofer.de
> Institutszentrum Schloss Birlinghoven         mobile +49-160-9664-2129
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> 

Received on Tuesday, 18 January 2005 13:10:58 UTC