Re: PROV-ISSUE-437 (prov-dm-post-f2f3-review): Final review before last call vote [prov-dm]

Luc,
all,

I've been looking at PROV-DM today.

I'm happy for it to go to last call with "MentionOf" at risk, possibly with 
attention to other points noted below.  I think there are still editorial 
improvements possible, but for the most part the thrust and intent is acceptably 
clear, and I think further editorial improvement can be made in the period 
following last call.

...

In section 5.5.3, I believe example 46 is incorrect.  The mentionOf expressions 
used imply that ex:report1 and ex:report2 are bundles when the defintion of 
mentionOf is taken into account.  I don't think this is intended.

(This comment is completely independent of my opposition to the mentionOf 
construct as currently proposed.  I intend to construct my case for this based 
on the final documents that go forward to last call.  I would, however, drop my 
opposition if mentionOf is reduced to a 2-place predicate like mentionOf(entity, 
bundle).  I mention this here simply to be clear about my position.)

...

In section 5.1.6, I'm finding the treatment of wasStartedBy is not 
straightforward.  The distinction between "trigger" and "starter" seems a bit 
arbitrary.  In this context, it seems to me that an activity may be started by 
another activity, which in turn may be associate with an agent.  Or, to put it 
another way, an agent only triggers an activity through association in another 
activity, thus:

   wasStartedBy(a1, a2)        (activity a1 was started by activity a2)
   wasAssociatedWith(a2, ag)   (agent ag was associated with activity a2)
or
   wasInfluencedBy(a2, e)      (entity e influenced activity a2)

So I'm thinking that wasStartedBy could be simplified by dropping the entity 
parameter.  But that doesn't completely address my uncertainty.

Part of my problem here is that it's all a bit unclear, and I can see different 
ways of expressing the idea that an agent started an activity:

1: wasStartedBy, as currently definbed
2: indirectly via another activity, as suggested above
3: by direct involvement, as in wasAssociatedWith(a, ag, [role="ex:startedBy"])

Such diversity of modeling options makes it harder to reconcile and reason over 
information coming from disparate sources.

I don't see this as a blocking issue, but I think ti would make it easier for 
people to generate provenance consistently if the options on wasStartedBy could 
be simplified.

...

Section 1.2

I think this should be split into two separate sections:

1.2 Notational conventions

1.3 Namespaces

When looking at documents, I often look in the table of contents to locate the 
namespace URIs, so having them buried under notational conventions is not most 
helpful.

...

Section 2.2, para 1

Suggest "more advanced uses of provenance" -->  "more specific uses of provenance"

...

Section 2.2.3

reading this, it's not clear to me why this specification s relevant to 
provenance description.  I think that, from a provenance perspective, the 
essence of example given could be expressed without knowing about the 
member/collection relationship.

...

Section 3

The brief introduction to notation does not mention the form of names used, or 
their correspondence to URIs (namespces, etc.).  I think this is at least as 
relevant to the following materials as the summary of functional notation and 
optional parameters.

...

Section 5.1.8, example 28

I'm finding it hard to see "buy one beer, get one free" as an *entity*.  I'd 
suggest dropping this example, as it seems rather contrived to me.

...

Section 5.6.2, memberOf parameter "complete"

I'm not seeing a clear distinction betweenthe 2nd and 3rd options here.  They 
both seem to mean "there may be more, but we don't know for sure", and differ 
only in the amount of certainty expressed.  I think the key distinction here is 
2-way: either the collection is closed (all members are known), or it is open 
(there may be more).  Trying to draw a finer distinction here I think does not 
help in any meaningful way.

...

Section 5.7.4

The namespace URI for PROV is already given in section 1.  Repeating it here is 
a hostage to fortune, and I don't think it serves any useful purpose here.

...

End of comments.

#g
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Received on Friday, 6 July 2012 15:48:47 UTC