Comments on last-call SPARQL draft 20050721, section 2

[Unfortunately, the last-call period for this coincided with a period of 
extended unavailability for me, so I'm rather late getting my comments 
together.  So far, I've got comments on section 2;  I'll send in more 
later if I can get them in on time.]

...

Section 2.1, "Query term syntax", para 2

It's not immediately clear that the qname form can be used for a 
datatype IRI;  maybe slip in an example here to show this is an allowed 
form?  (e.g. that 42, "42"^^xsd:integer and "42"^^<http://...#integer> 
are forms of the same literal.)

...

Section 2.1, "Query term syntax", para 4

I feel that allowing a prefix to be redefined as described could create 
some small unnecessary complication for implementations that don't 
process the query sequentially, and creates scope for implementation 
errors.  I would suggest not allowing prefixes to be redefined.  Is 
there a compelling case for allowing such redefinition?

...

Section 2.1, "Query term syntax", para 5

I'm a bit hazy on the details, but the discussion of combining 
characters goes against my recollection that RDF specifies that 
URI-references muct be in normal form C, which I think was intended to 
avoid some of these issues.  I think that SPARQL should follow RDF in 
the forms of URI/IRI that it allows.

...

Section 2.2, "Definition: Query Variable"

I'm really having a hard time figuring what this definition is trying to 
say.  It refers to *the* set V, which has not been defined, and which 
seems to be almost completely spurious to the definition of "query 
variable".  I think this is saying simply that a query vbariable is any 
value that is not in RDF-T.

...

Section 2.3

Concerning the reference to literals-as-subjects.  Is this still an 
option for the Semantic Web family?  I understand that OWL (or OWL-DL) 
requires that subjects be URIs.  Maybe not a problem, but I thought I'd 
mention it.

...

Section 2.4, "Definition: Query Solution"

What does it mean for a "pattern solution" to be "matching dataset DS". 
  I can't see any definition of what it means to be "matching".  I think 
this idea could be defined more precisely by reference to the concept of 
graph instances as defined in the RDF formal semantics specification. 
As it stands, I think there could be awkward questions raised;  e.g. does
   ?v a b .
match
   _v a b .
?  (that is, after substitutions have been applied, which allow some 
query variables to remain unreplaced)

...

Section 2.5

The paragraph beginning "For a basic graph pattern to match..." is 
rather awkward to read.  There are two mentions of "solution" which 
grammatically can be distinct, but logically are the same.

Suggest (something like):  For a basic graph pattern to match some 
target dataset, there must be a pattern solution using which each of the 
triple patterns matches the target dataset.

(Refering back to my previous comment about the definition of matching, 
this seems to allow a definition that builds upon a definition of 
matching a single triple pattern against a target dataset, which could 
be done quite precisely by enumeration of options.)

...

Section 2.7

I think it's confusing to say that a blank node behaves as a variable, 
as a blank node in a query pattern doesn't return a binding.  Also, a 
query variable can be bound to a blank node, but not to another query 
variable.

Better, I think, to delete the clause "It behaves as a variable; " -- 
the remaining text seems sufficient to the purpose here.

...

That's all for now.  I'll try and do some more later (but I'll be 
travelling and may be unable to do so by the last-call deadline).

#g

-- 
Graham Klyne
For email:
http://www.ninebynine.org/#Contact

Received on Thursday, 1 September 2005 11:28:14 UTC