Name change for sameClassAs

Input for agenda item 3.1 of today's telecon

While revising the Reference document (still in progress, I'm afraid, 
although it is cominng to a close), I have become convinced that 
sameClassAs is really a misnomer.
Several reviewers have made this point, for example, Brian McBride in:

http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-webont-comments/2003Jan/0001.html

I find the arguments compelling. The semantics of this construct say 
that it means that two classes have the same class extension, which is 
something really different from class equality (the same intensional 
meaning, denoting the same concept).

I propose to rename "sameClassAs" to either "sameMembersAs" or 
"sameInstancesAs". The name "sameExtensionAs" would also be accceptable 
to me, although a bit techie. I could live with "EquivalentClassAs", 
(which might be the preference of some as it is the term  used in AS&S), 
because equality and equivalence is different.

As a side note: in essnece, class equality can only be expressed with 
same(Individual)As, which means class equality is only in Full.

Guus

-- 
A. Th. Schreiber, SWI, University of Amsterdam,
http://www.swi.psy.uva.nl/usr/Schreiber/home.html

Received on Thursday, 30 January 2003 09:28:48 UTC