Re: Statings -- Much ado about nothing

Bob MacGregor wrote:

> >> The RDF reification vocabulary consists of a class name and three 
> property
> >> names.  Semantic extensions MAY limit the interpretation of these 
> so that
> >> a triple of the form
> >>      aaa rdf:type rdf:Statement .
> >> is true in I just when I(aaa) is a token of an RDF triple in some RD
> >> document, and the three properties, when applied to such a denoted 
> triple,
> >> have the same values as the respective components of that triple.
>
> However, the caveats are legion:
>
> First, its says that 'extensions' may limit the interpretation.  This 
> means
> that RDF itself places no such limitations.
>
> Second, it refers to a triple in 'some' RDF document.  Nothing relates 
> the
> document where a stating occurs to that other document.  From an 
> implementation
> perspective, this means that there is no possible way that one could 
> verify
> that the triple referred to does not in fact exist, i.e., it is
> impossible to check whether or not the triple that a stating refers to
> does or does not exist. 

Sure there is a way:  the document (source, or database) which contins 
the original triple is just more metadata about the stating.  If an 
application needs that information, then it should annotate the stating 
accordingly ... perhaps like the following:

  _:1  rdf:type rdf:Statement
  _:1  rdf:subject <Xsubject>
  _:1 rdf:predicate <Ppredicate>
  _:1 rdf:object <Oobject>
  _:1 ex:containedIn <http:foo/bar.rdf>
  _:1 ex:sethComment "The fact that, that statement is in that document, 
sucks big time"

Seth Russell
http://radio.weblogs.com/0113759/

Received on Friday, 7 February 2003 16:28:55 UTC