Re: Datatyping (was: Requirements for a possible "RDF 2.0")

On Wed, 2010-01-20 at 09:58 -0600, Pat Hayes wrote:
> On Jan 20, 2010, at 8:05 AM, David Booth wrote:
> 
> > On Wed, 2010-01-20 at 10:14 +0000, Graham Klyne wrote:
> >> One of the things I failed to realize in time to
> >> put my weight behind it was that an approach to datatyping based on
> >> interpretation properties, which was proposed by Dan Connolly,  
> >> could be as
> >> convenient to use, if not more so, than the current datatyping  
> >> scheme, and would
> >> keep the core of RDF very much simpler.
> 
> We did consider designs like this, but there were strong arguments  
> made against them, chiefly the issues of triple-bloat (IMO not v.  
> important) and what to do about partial/missing information (IMO very  
> important.)
> 
> Also, there is a general design issue here, which is that keeping the  
> 'core' of RDF simple, at the cost making actual RDF used by users more  
> complicated, seems to me exactly the way we should not be going. If  
> anything, we leaned too far in that direction already.

IMO Interpretation Properties help give both, but of course YMMV.  

Mind you, I don't think this is currently a big enough problem to
motivate an RDF 2.0, but if an RDF 2.0 were being designed, I think it
should be a candidate for inclusion.

> 
> >
> > I agree.  The interpretation properties[1] approach is very general,
> > clean and logical.  If it feels inconvenient, that seems to me like an
> > argument for syntactic sugar rather than a different approach.
> 
> All my alarm bells go off when I read sentences like this. Allow me to  
> offer a translation. This idea is great because it makes theoreticians  
> happy, and if it doesn't match user intuitions, then we can fudge some  
> way to make it seem invisible: they will never notice, don't worry.  
> They are too dumb to see what the actual syntax is really like. After  
> all, nobody ever looks at actual XML, right?

Well, that's an amusing translation :) but it isn't what I had in mind.
I for one find that the Interpretation Properties approach *does* match
my user intuition.  

David

> 
> Pat Hayes
> 
> >
> > 1. http://www.w3.org/DesignIssues/InterpretationProperties.html
> >
> >
> > -- 
> > David Booth, Ph.D.
> > Cleveland Clinic (contractor)
> >
> > Opinions expressed herein are those of the author and do not  
> > necessarily
> > reflect those of Cleveland Clinic.
> >
> >
> >
> 
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> 
> 
> 
> 
> 


-- 
David Booth, Ph.D.
Cleveland Clinic (contractor)

Opinions expressed herein are those of the author and do not necessarily
reflect those of Cleveland Clinic.

Received on Wednesday, 20 January 2010 17:11:43 UTC