(poll) renaming rdf:text to rdf:plainLiteral

It seems like most of the furor over rdf:text has been caused by some
misunderstandings about its intended role.  One of the proposals to help
clarify its role has been to rename it from rdf:text to
rdf:plainLiteral.  The idea behind this name is to help underscore that
it is exactly equivalent (mapping 1-1) to "RDF Plain Literals" [1].  It
is not something else, something new, different, or useful in it's own
right.  It's just a standard way for systems to handle RDF Plain
Literals as XML datatype values.  Systems can use it if it makes it
easier for them, working with RDF data outside of RDF graphs (as in RIF
and OWL 2).  Within RDF graphs, by definition, there is direct support
of RDF Plain Literals.

The original renaming proposal [2] was from Axel, and so far everyone
who has talked about it on public-rdf-text seems supportive of it.
Before we (that is, Boris) actually edit(s) that spec to make the name
change, we wanted to do a quick check to see if anyone has a problem
with this.  Obviously, we'll also need to make the name change in
various other documents.  I know it's a bit of a hassle, but try reading
a day of the rdf-text mailing list; you'll start to see why a change
like this starts to seem cheap and easy.

Thoughts?

     -- Sandro


[1] http://www.w3.org/TR/rdf-concepts/#dfn-plain-literal
[2] http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-rdf-text/2009AprJun/0148

Received on Saturday, 23 May 2009 03:33:28 UTC