- From: Leigh Dodds <leigh@ldodds.com>
- Date: Thu, 18 Apr 2013 11:27:43 +0100
- To: Hugh Glaser <hg@ecs.soton.ac.uk>
- Cc: Barry Norton <barry.norton@ontotext.com>, Luca Matteis <lmatteis@gmail.com>, "public-lod@w3.org> <public-lod@w3.org" <public-lod@w3.org>
Hi Hugh, On Thu, Apr 18, 2013 at 10:56 AM, Hugh Glaser <hg@ecs.soton.ac.uk> wrote: > (Yes, Linked Data API is cool!, and thanks for getting back to the main subject, although I somehow doubt anyone is expecting to read anything about it in this thread now :-) ) I'm still hoping we might return to the original topic :) What this discussion, and in fact most related discussions about SPARQL as a web service, seems to overlook is that there are several different issues in play here: * Whether SPARQL is more accessible to developers than other forms of web API. For example is the learning curve, harder or easier? * Whether offering query languages like SPARQL, SQL, YQL, etc is a sensible option when offering a public API and what kinds of quality of service can be wrapped around that. Or do other forms of API offer more options for providing quality of service by trading off power of query expression? * Techniques for making SPARQL endpoints scale in scenarios where the typical query patterns are unknown (which is true of most public endpoints). Scaling and quality of service considerations for a public web service and a private enterprise endpoint are different. Not all of the techniques that people use, e.g. query timeouts or partial results, are actually standardised so plenty of scope for more exploration here. * Whether SPARQL is the only query language we need for RDF, or for more general graph databases, or whether there are room for other forms of graph query languages The Linked Data API was designed to provide a simplified read-only API that is less expressive than full SPARQL. The goals were to make something easier to use, but not preclude helping developers towards using full SPARQL if that's what they wanted. It also fills a short-fall with most Linked Data publishing approaches, i.e. that getting lists of things, possibly as a paged list, possibly with some simple filtering is not easy. We don't need a full graph query language for that. The Linked Data Platform is looking at that area too, but its also got a lot more requirements its trying to address. Cheers, L. -- Leigh Dodds Freelance Technologist Open Data, Linked Data Geek t: @ldodds w: ldodds.com e: leigh@ldodds.com
Received on Thursday, 18 April 2013 10:28:10 UTC