RE: open-ended date ranges for dataset descriptions

Dan,

 

If I understand correctly, you are looking for a string-based expression of open intervals. 

 

The European DCAT Application Profile employs a ‘thing’-based approach and models date ranges for temporal coverage as dct:PeriodOfTime with schema:startDate and schema:endDate. 

 

E.g.:

 

:DatasetX dct:temporal [ 

   a dct:PeriodOfTime ; 

  schema:startDate “2011” ; 

  schema:endDate “2017” ; 

] .

 

The specification allows only one of the limits to be provided so if only the start date is provided the end date is unbounded.

 

Makx.

 

From: Dan Brickley [mailto:danbri@google.com] 
Sent: 01 March 2018 20:39
To: Dataset Exchange Working Group <public-dxwg-wg@w3.org>
Subject: open-ended date ranges for dataset descriptions

 

Hi DXWG,

 

Is the topic of open-ended date ranges under consideration anywhere in this WG, or already in the wider DCAT community? It has cropped up in the context of Google's dataset search efforts, and digging around I see it was discussed inconclusively in the Schema.org W3C Community Group back in 2016. The rough conclusion then seemed to be that extensions to ISO 8601 were needed; reading around again today it seems that might happen via the next version of the ISO spec. Does anyone have a good feel for the issues and current best practices? 

 

Schema.org discussion on this is in https://github.com/schemaorg/schemaorg/issues/1365#issuecomment-369703879

 

Dan