Annotation properties with range and other rdf:types

I have concerns about the latest specification of annotation properties.
As a tool developer, I would like to handle annotation properties very
similar to "normal" properties; in particular I want to be able to state
that an AnnotationProperty is also a DatatypeProperty or an
ObjectProperty, and I want to define the range of an AnnotationProperty.
Although OWL Full allows me to do so, it is not valid OWL DL: See test
004 at
http://www.w3.org/2002/03owlt/editors-draft/draft/byFunction#function-An
notationProperty

From a tool builder's perspective, handling annotation properties
different from other "heavy" properties means a considerable overhead,
and makes it very difficult to provide useful editor components for
annotation values. Without information about
the type of allowed values, I would have to ask the user "what would you
like to enter next: A string, an integer, an object, an..."?  I would
also have problems to select appropriate graphical widgets for
annotation properties, if I don't know in advance what values it could
take.

My naive understanding is that being an annotation property is more or
less just another characteristic of a property, somehow like a boolean
flag. The classifier could simply ignore all properties that have this
flag.

(Protege) User feedback suggests that annotation properties are an
extremely important feature, especially to attach all types of
information to classes without having to disable the classifier.  The
current specification is a serious obstacle.

Kind regards,
Holger

Received on Tuesday, 2 December 2003 19:13:17 UTC