Re: Clarification needed on BIND

Hi Rob,

You are right.  Thanks for pointing this out.  I must have jumped
directly to the BIND subsection without noticing the introductory part.
On closer examination, I now see that this is also clarified in sec
18.2.4.4:
http://www.w3.org/TR/sparql11-query/#sparqlSelectExpressions
"variable must not appear in VS; if it does then generate a syntax error
and stop".  Sorry for the inconvenience.

David

On Thu, 2011-09-08 at 10:29 +0100, Rob Vesse wrote:
> Hi David
> 
> I'm not a member of the Working Group but the behaviour of BIND in this
> case is mentioned in the specification although in the introductory section
> on assignment rather than directly with the definition of BIND so perhaps
> needs highlighting better?
> 
> The first sentence of the section on assignment [1] makes reference to the
> variable scoping rules [2] and goes on to say that "The new variable must
> not already be in-scope in the query at that point it is used" i.e. you can
> only use a BIND on a variable that is not in-scope at the point where the
> BIND occurs
> 
> So your example would throw an error since ?title is already in-scope when
> the 2nd BIND is reached but you could have queries where you bound on the
> same variable more than once e.g. a BIND in each part of a UNION
> 
> Hope that helps
> 
> Rob
> 
> [1]: http://www.w3.org/TR/sparql11-query/#assignment
> [2]: http://www.w3.org/TR/sparql11-query/#variableScope
> 
> On Wed, 07 Sep 2011 11:40:45 -0400, David Booth <david@dbooth.org> wrote:
> > Regarding sec 10.1 "BIND: Assigning to Variables":
> > http://www.w3.org/TR/sparql11-query/#bind
> > 
> > What happens if the same variable is bound more than once using BIND?
> > For example:
> > 
> > PREFIX  dc:  <http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/>
> > PREFIX  ns:  <http://example.org/ns#>
> > SELECT  ?title ?price
> > {  
> >    BIND (?title as "The World")
> >    BIND (?title as "The Universe")
> >    ?x dc:title ?title ; ns:price ?p .
> > }
> > 
> > Should this be handled as:
> > 
> >  - an error?
> > 
> >  - both bindings are used (to produce multiple solutions)?
> > 
> >  - The first or last BIND statement for ?title takes precedence?
> > 
> > It would be helpful to clarify this in the spec.
> > 
> > Thanks
> 

-- 
David Booth, Ph.D.
http://dbooth.org/

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Received on Friday, 9 September 2011 03:15:44 UTC