RE: web proper names redux

Tony still raises a very important point, though.  I would suggest that
we stop using the adjective "opaque" in reference to URIs, since it's
almost always interpreted to mean more than originally intended.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: www-rdf-interest-request@w3.org 
> [mailto:www-rdf-interest-request@w3.org] On Behalf Of Thomas B. Passin
> Sent: Monday, September 27, 2004 5:20 PM
> To: www-rdf-interest@w3.org
> Cc: ht@inf.ed.ac.uk
> Subject: Re: web proper names redux
> 
> 
> Hammond, Tony wrote:
> >>This isn't really a "solution" at the RDF level, since URIs 
> are fully 
> >>opaque, and thus, one is not licensed to examine the URI scheme to 
> >>make decisions regarding the meaning of a given URI, insofar as the 
> >>RDF MT is concerned. True, some people do that, but that is 
> >>non-conformant and potentially dangerous behavior for a SW client.
> > 
> > 
> > This actually should not go unchallenged - it is simply 
> incorrect - see 
> > 
> > 	http://w3.org/TR/webarch/#uri-opacity
> 
> Patrick specifically qualified the remark you quoted above by 
> restricting it to the RDF Recs.  Any parsing of URLs is above 
> and beyond 
> what a conformant RDF processor is required to do.  There is 
> nothing to 
> prevent you from parsing out a uri and using the results to 
> add triples, 
> and it might even be very useful sometimes, but it's not 
> provided for by 
> RDF.  And why should it be?  At present, RDF has no mechanism to 
> incorporate any specific uri into itself, no matter how 
> useful it might 
> be.  I don't see a good reason to integrate in a specific uri scheme 
> that can be parsed, when we can't integrate any uris, period.
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> Tom P
> 
> -- 
> Thomas B. Passin
> Explorer's Guide to the Semantic Web (Manning Books)
> http://www.manning.com/catalog/view.php?book=passin
> 
>