Re: literals must be self-evident

At 12:43 PM 10/17/01 -0500, Dan Connolly wrote:
>That is: it's essential that the interpretation of
>an RDF document is a function of the document alone,
>and doesn't vary according to the contents of other
>documents.

I think I agree with the thrust here, but I'd like to clarify 
something:  it may be that access to another document will provide more 
detailed information about what is stated in a document (e.g. knowing the 
domain/range of a property from a separate schema may allow one to make 
additional inferences about resources used in an otherwise stand-alone 
document).

The key requirement here seems to be that the interpretation of a document 
in isolation cannot be invalidated when some external document is also 
consulted.  (This seems to be a kind of monotonicity.)

Thus, I think what you are asking is that the truth under any given 
interpretation of some RDF document is invariant;  consulting another 
document may restrict the interpretations that are considered to be models.

#g


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Graham Klyne                    MIMEsweeper Group
Strategic Research              <http://www.mimesweeper.com>
<Graham.Klyne@MIMEsweeper.com>
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Received on Wednesday, 17 October 2001 15:58:55 UTC