ACTION-287: Draft of WG response to LC-Comment 51 / #1 (functional data properties)

Hi!

This is my draft response to the 1st comment of Ralf Möller's LC comment 51 (rm1).

Please note that Ralf's mail actually contains two other points, which are completely unrelated to the first comment, and which we did not discuss so far. So I did /not/ draft a reply for the other two points. 

Michael

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Dear Ralf,

Thank you for your comments

<http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-owl-comments/2009Jan/0059.html>

on the OWL 2 Web Ontology Language last call drafts.

Your mail actually contains three distinct comments. This response exclusively covers your first comment. There will be additional responses to your other two comments.

In your first comment, you state:

"""
I strongly recommend to change the OWL2 specification in such a way  
that data properties are always functional.
"""

The working group acknowledges that by applying the approach you mention in your comment it would indeed be sufficient if all data properties would be functional.

However, the working group is aware of the fact that the original OWL language did not restrict data properties to be functional. Therefore, restricting data properties to be functional in OWL 2 would break backwards compatibility with OWL.

For this reason, the working group has decided not to make the requested change to OWL 2.

Please acknowledge receipt of this email to 
<mailto:public-owl-comments@w3.org> (replying to this email should 
suffice). In your acknowledgment please let us know whether or not you 
are satisfied with the working group's response to your comment.

Regards,
Michael Schneider
on behalf of the W3C OWL Working Group

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--
Dipl.-Inform. Michael Schneider
Research Scientist, Dept. Information Process Engineering (IPE)
Tel  : +49-721-9654-726
Fax  : +49-721-9654-727
Email: schneid@fzi.de
WWW  : http://www.fzi.de/ipe/eng/mitarbeiter.php?id=555

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Vorsitzender des Kuratoriums: Ministerialdirigent Günther Leßnerkraus

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