Re: replies on named graphs? containers use case

RDF's containers are a sorry blot on the language.  We would be much 
better off
if they had never been invented.  For declaring a set of objects, one 
can choose their
favorite 'hasMember' predicate, and assert the members of the set, without
needing to extend the RDF language.  However, its frequently the case 
that there
is a stronger semantics associated with a collection, in which case the 
predicate
chosen to map from a collection to its members can use that stronger 
predicate.
The strong-semantics option is not available with collections.

The numbered predicates used for sequences are a bastardization of the
predicates that is particularly sorry.  'first' and 'rest' for lists are 
regrettably
verbose, but they capture the semantics accurately, and should be used
in preference to sequences.

- Bob


Giovanni Tummarello wrote:

>
>
> A few days ago, Kampman made an important remark about named graph 
> semantics but i havent seen any reply, did i miss some?
>
> Also, i also would like to argue for the support for containers.
> For a very interesting use case (that i cant possibly solve without 
> query language support) see .
>
> http://giovanni.ea.unian.it/temp/rdftef.pdf
>
> Textual encoding using RDF (requiring chains of words/symbols)
>
> the fact that there is no knowledge on how to implement this 
> efficiently shouldnt probably be an issue?.. i guess they'll be 
> inefficient at first, but at least people can use them if needed.
>
> Giovanni
>
>

-- 

Bob MacGregor
Chief Scientist

	
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