RE: RDF-Based Semantics ready for WG-internal Review

Hi Ivan!

Ivan Herman wrote:

>Michael Schneider wrote:
>> Dear all, Dear Reviewers!
>>
>> I'm happy to announce that the OWL 2 RDF-Based Semantics is now ready
>for WG-internal review.
>>
>>  <http://www.w3.org/2007/OWL/wiki/index.php?title=RDF-
>Based_Semantics&oldid=20977>
>>
>
>Huge step forward! Big plus to you...:-)

Many thanks! :)

>> 1) Naming-Issue:

[snip]

>- there are some places where you refer to 'OWL 2 Full
>Interpretation/Satisfaction/Entailement'). Strictly speaking, this may
>not be 100% o.k., 

I called them this way, because you will find the analog names ("OWL Full XXX") in Section 5.3 ("OWL Full") of the SAS:

  <http://www.w3.org/TR/owl-semantics/rdfs.html#5.3>

>but I see the same issue arising in the Direct
>Semantics which says, for example, that 'An interpretation I satisfies
>an OWL 2 ontology...'. But I do not think it is really a source of major
>misunderstandings.

I don't think that "misunderstandings" are the main problem here, since all these terms are well defined in the document. It's more about coherence of the naming scheme. This is, from a technical point of view, a null-issue, of course. But, as we have learnt from LC1, technical issues are not the only issues people outside the working group care about...

>Maybe, in both cases, the introduction section should
>make a clear statement saying something like
>
>[[[
>in this document, the word semantics, interpretation, semantics, etc,
>strictly refer to the RDF compatible semantics.  OWL 2 Ontologies can
>have other semantics (ref to direct semantics) but this document does
>not deal with that alternative except when explicitly mentioned.
>]]]
>
>(the same in the direct semantics with the obvious changes)

I was under the impression that it would be (part of) the purpose of the "Document Overview" to provide this sort of clarification. And, apart from this, saying that some syntactic expression (such as an OWL 2 ontology) can have different semantics is a tautology; there can always be infinitely many different semantics for any given syntax. My main concern with this proposed text is, however, that it doesn't really help in understanding the choice when the term "RDF-Based" is used, and when "OWL 2 Full". 

Just to be clear, these are only personal concerns, not more. If anyone else is happy with the naming used in the document, then I will be fine with shipping it in this form. It's becoming tedious and time wasting for me to try anticipating all the time what people will or will not find bothersome in the end. If there are public reviewers having any trouble with the actual naming scheme, then they should talk up, possibly in a constructive way to give me/us guidance on how to best call the different things. In any case, this cannot lead to more than just editorial changes, and so this will not lead to a new LC round.

Cheers,
Michael

--
Dipl.-Inform. Michael Schneider
Research Scientist, Dept. Information Process Engineering (IPE)
Tel  : +49-721-9654-726
Fax  : +49-721-9654-727
Email: michael.schneider@fzi.de
WWW  : http://www.fzi.de/michael.schneider
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