RE: Territorial Units Thesaurus

Hi Javier,

Thanks for this, it raises a couple of important issues.  

> First:
> 
> The comments of the preflabel property says: "/No two concepts in the 
> same concept scheme may have the same value for skos:prefLabel in a 
> given language."/
> 
> But for a territorial thesaurus there are different places 
> with the same 
> name (for example, two cities with the same name in different 
> provinces)
> I think this is not a problem if the two concept have different 
> identifiers, that depends of the kind of thesausus that is being 
> created, in some of them  the repetition of preflabels is not 
> recomendable but in others should be posible.

The idea I'm currently working on is to define some 'test cases' for SKOS data, relating to particular types of usage.  So for example, the first test case I want to define is a 'Thesaurus Compatibility' test case - this establishes whether your SKOS data could be used in traditional thesaurus systems (i.e. whether your SKOS concept scheme could be used as a thesaurus).  For this test case, the skos:prefLabel constraint mentioned above is vital.  However, as you rightly mention, for other usage scenarios and types of concept scheme, such a constraint may not be necessary.

... anyway, I'm still working on this, watch this space.

For now, I would say it's OK for you to violate the skos:prefLabel constraint, provided you understand the consequences - i.e. your concept scheme will no longer be usable as a thesaurus.

> 
> Second:
> 
> In the territorial units thesausus, we have a label that is 
> the "oficial 
> name" of a place, that can be in different languages for different 
> cities in the same country. For some of hte places there is 
> translation 
> of that label to the other official languages of the conuntry but for 
> others there is not translation and the "oficial name".
> We consider that label the default label to return when there is not 
> translation in the language we are aking for, but we dont 
> have clear how 
> to represent that label.
> 
> Our alternative is to put the "oficial name" as a preflabel without 
> language (considering it a kind of default preflabel) and the 
> translations as preflabels with language property, but we are 
> not sure 
> if this aproach is valid in SKOS.
> 
> Example:
> <skos:prefLabel>ILLES BALEARS</skos:prefLabel>  (Oficial name)
> <skos:prefLabel xml:lang="es">ISLAS BALEARES</skos:prefLabel> 
> (Translations)

I would suggest a refinement of skos:prefLabel.  There is a draft of an appendix for the SKOS Core Guide describing how to declare and use refinements, see:

http://isegserv.itd.rl.ac.uk/cvs-public/~checkout~/skos/drafts/appextensions.html?rev=1.7#hExSpecLabelling

... beware, this is only a draft!

Cheers,

Al.

Received on Tuesday, 25 October 2005 11:55:54 UTC