- From: Thomas B. Passin <tpassin@comcast.net>
- Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 17:28:28 -0400
- To: www-rdf-interest@w3.org
Harry Halpin wrote: > > Also, as regards Passim's predicates: > 1) subjectIsTheThingReturnedByThisURI > 2) theDocumentAtThisUriDescribesTheSubject > 3) theDocumentAtThisUriIsAboutTheSubject > > I would replace "Document" with "Representation", and I'm not sure > about this "About" versus "Describes" distinction. Seems unclear. "About" as I used it here means the main subject of the web page (or other retrievable) resource. An example would be an encyclopedia article about water. The purpose of the page is related to the subject (here, water), and is not intended to explain the use of any URI identifier for water, such as http://www.example.com/water. "Describes" as I used it here means that the page attempts to explain the "meaning" or subject of the URI. For example, an English language Description for the URI might be as follows - "The URI 'http://www.example.com/water-liquid' is a URI intended to identify the abstract concept called "water", or H20. It specifically refers to H20 in its liquid state." You see, the distinction is that the second or "theDocumentAtThisUriDescribesTheSubject" example, is intended to explicate the thing identified by the URI. The third, or "theDocumentAtThisUriIsAboutTheSubject", is simply about the subject, like the encylopedia article. I grant you that the "isAbout"-ness may not be discoverable by machine, at least for pages written in natural language, but we are always going to have that problem Imagine converting, say, the rdf Recommendation(s) into rdf/owl with no human-readable text. It would never work - somewhere, there have to be readable explanations of what the various terms and concepts mean. Cheers, Tom P -- Thomas B. Passin Explorer's Guide to the Semantic Web (Manning Books) http://www.manning.com/catalog/view.php?book=passin
Received on Monday, 20 September 2004 21:25:32 UTC