Re: rdfs:Graph ? comment on http://www.w3.org/TR/rdf11-concepts/#section-dataset and issue 35

Jeremy,

Thank you very much for you comments and interest.  As you may know, the 
Working Group has discussed the issues around Named Graphs and Datasets 
extensively, for over two years now.  The Last Call version of RDF 1.1 
Concepts includes a minimalist design that we believe is a reasonable 
foundation on which interoperable systems can be built, although in many 
cases those systems will require additional standards in order to have 
interoperability. Many designs were considered for adding more 
expressivity/functionality, but the Working Group decided that none of 
them were sufficiently mature to include in the current 
Recommendation-Track documents, which are to be completed by the end of 
the year.

We have agreed in principle to published two Working Groups Notes to 
provide some guidance and tools for people to move forward with this 
minimal design, gathering experience with built on it, to support future 
standards work.  Specifically, I am drafting one, aimed at programmers 
using datasets for several common use cases, building on classes like 
your suggested rdfs:Graph.  Meanwhile, Antoine Zimmerman is drafting 
another, offering a framework for providing formal semantics to 
datasets.  As Working Group Notes, as you know, these documents can 
offer experimental solutions, not refined and tested to the degree 
required of Recommendations.   If you are interested in reviewing early 
drafts of the note I'm working on, or otherwise helping (test cases?), 
please let me know and I'll keep you in the loop.

We understand this isn't your preferred outcome, but under the 
circumstances, are you satisfied with this response?

Also: please note that the SPARQL Working Group (the successor to DAWG) 
has concluded.   Its comments list (which you CC'd and I'm also CC'ing) 
is being used for errata handling and gathering material for a possible 
future group.    For discussion, the right forums are probably either 
public-sparql-dev@w3.org or the RDF Working Group.

On behalf of the RDF Working Group,
     -- Sandro





On 07/11/2013 03:06 PM, Jeremy J Carroll wrote:
>
> Hello
>
> This is a formal comment on http://www.w3.org/TR/rdf11-concepts/#section-dataset, and it appears a comment on
> https://dvcs.w3.org/hg/rdf/raw-file/default/rdf-schema/index.html
> and quite possibly on the RDF Semantics ….
>
> It seems to be a suggestion to reopen issue 35
> http://www.w3.org/2011/rdf-wg/track/issues/35
> which points to
> http://www.w3.org/TR/sparql11-service-description/
> hence I am CC-ing dawg.
> The last part of this message discusses problems in using service description to meet my use case: to me, this is not a comment on DAWG's work, but a comment that RDF Core cannot use DAWG's work of more limited scope to duck the issue.
>
>
> Summary: I would like to use rdf to describe graphs in a dataset, e.g. to say who the author was.
>
> as a simple example
>
> my:graph {
>     my:graph dc:creator "Jeremy J. Carroll" .
> }
>
> I cannot see how to do this with the current drafts, editors drafts, etc.
>
> A possible approach would be to reopen issue 35  and have a class rdfs:Graph, s.t. for a <URI> used as the name of a graph in a dataset the triple
>     <URI> rdf:type rdfs:Graph
> holds.
> More weakly, I would be satisfied with such a concept being added to the RDF vocabulary, without the implication above holding, but a suggested usage pattern.
>
> Also, I basically finished this message before finding issue 35 and it's superficially reasonable resolution that sd:Graph may meet my needs. This suggests that some documentation link from either RDF Concepts or RDF Schema or RDF Semantics to SPARQL Service Description would be helpful ….
> However, the Service Description doc
> http://www.w3.org/TR/sparql11-service-description/
> ducks on the issue of whether the name denotes the graph, and so does not give me a clear place to put such metadata.
> I think if the RDF WG tried writing such documentation, they would discover that the resolution of issue 35 would unravel - the trick is to allow such unravelling without having too much of the named graphs work unravel.
>
> ----
>
>
> Here is my actual use case …..
>
>
>
>
>
> I first give my motivation, then I give my weak suggestion.
>
> Motivation:
> =========
>
> I referred to RDF Concepts 1.1 today because I am constructing an RDF dataset and wished to add metadata concerning the named graphs.
> I am trying to articulate a multi tenant architecture over a SPARQL end point, in which each user is assigned to a specific organization, and then depending on this organization, they have access to different named graphs.
>
> I wish to refer to the named graphs using the URI names I have assigned to them, and I wish to create my own property to add this metadata
>
>
> Concretely, my property might be
>         syapse:owningOrganization
>
> and the quads I was thinking of producing include
>
> GRAPH <https://test.syapse.com/graph/syapse> {
>      <https://test.syapse.com/graph/syapse> syapse:owningOrganization syapse: .
>       syapse:owningOrganization rdf:type owl:FunctionalProperty .
>       syapse:owningOrganization rdfs:range syapse:Organization .
>       syapse:   rdf:type syapse:Organization .
>       syapse:Organization rdf:type rdfs:Class .
>      …
>      …
> }
>
> GRAPH <https://test.syapse.com/graph/ontology/base> {
>      <https://test.syapse.com/graph/ontology/base> syapse:owningOrganization syapse: .
>      …
>      …
> }
>
> GRAPH <https://test.syapse.com/graph/ontology/sys> {
>      <https://test.syapse.com/graph/ontology/sys> syapse:owningOrganization syapse: .
>      …
>      …
> }
>
> GRAPH <https://test.syapse.com/graph/ontology/c2> {
>      <https://test.syapse.com/graph/ontology/c2> syapse:owningOrganization <https://test.syapse.com/graph/southParkUniversity> .
>      …
>      …
> }
>
> GRAPH <https://test.syapse.com/graph/southParkUniversity/abox> {
>      <https://test.syapse.com/graph/southParkUniversity/abox> syapse:owningOrganization <https://test.syapse.com/graph/southParkUniversity> .
>      <https://test.syapse.com/graph/southParkUniversity> rdf:type syapse:Organization .
>      …
>      …
> }
>
>
> This allows me to run a privileged SPARQL query across the whole dataset to find out which graphs are assigned to which organization, and then knowing which organization a user is in, I can have application logic to determine which named graphs they can access, and restrict their queries to those named graphs.
>
>
> Weak suggestion
> ==============
>
> I read the very limited text in the dataset section, and the note as reflecting a victory for those who do not want the implication that the name of the graph is a graph to hold.
> As a long standing advocate of the other position in which, of course, it denotes … I am somewhat disappointed.
>
> However, adding such a vocab item can allow the users to decide on a case-by-case basis whether such denotation is intended or not.
>
> e.g.
>
>     rdfs:Graph
>       rdfs:Graph is the class of RDF Graphs as defined by RDF Concepts.
>       
>
>    Semantics:
>
>     <g> { …. }
>
>     does not imply
>      
>      g rdf:type rdfs:Graph
>
>
> but
>
>      <g> { …. } .
>      <g>  rdf:type rdfs:Graph
>
> does imply that the interpretation of <g> is given by the graph.
>
>
> Problems with the Service Description approach
> =====================================
>
> Reading
> http://www.w3.org/TR/sparql11-service-description/
> my understanding is that the intent is for the endpoint to provide (closed) metadata about the dataset, which does not enable further comment even from someone with update privileges on the dataset.
>
> e.g. in
>
>
>
> @prefix sd: <http://www.w3.org/ns/sparql-service-description#> .
> @prefix ent: <http://www.w3.org/ns/entailment/> .
> @prefix prof: <http://www.w3.org/ns/owl-profile/> .
> @prefix void: <http://rdfs.org/ns/void#> .
>
> [] a sd:Service ;
>      sd:endpoint <http://www.example/sparql/> ;
>      sd:supportedLanguage sd:SPARQL11Query ;
>      sd:resultFormat <http://www.w3.org/ns/formats/RDF_XML>, <http://www.w3.org/ns/formats/Turtle> ;
>      sd:extensionFunction <http://example.org/Distance> ;
>      sd:feature sd:DereferencesURIs ;
>      sd:defaultEntailmentRegime ent:RDFS ;
>      sd:defaultDataset [
>          a sd:Dataset ;
>          sd:defaultGraph [
>              a sd:Graph ;
>              void:triples 100
>          ] ;
>          sd:namedGraph [
>              a sd:NamedGraph ;
>              sd:name <http://www.example/named-graph> ;
>              sd:entailmentRegime ent:OWL-RDF-Based ;
>              sd:supportedEntailmentProfile prof:RL ;
>              sd:graph [
>                  a sd:Graph ;
>                  void:triples 2000
>              ]
>          ]
>      ] .
>
> <http://example.org/Distance> a sd:Function .
>
>
> The description of the named graph is attached to an explicitly blank node, that I then cannot make further comment in in my own graph or indeed inside the graph named <http://www.example/named-graph> itself.
> Thus I cannot add a dc:creator (or syapse:owningOrganization) triple inside this service description (because SPARQL 1.1 does not give me, nor does it intend to give me) write access to the service description, even if I have write access to <http://www.example/named-graph>
>
> These issues perhaps could be addressed by making sd:graph and sd:name  both 1-1 properties …. but I imagine there may be some reluctance ….
>
> NB - this last comment, is not a formal comment on the Service Description Spec, which seems fit-for-purpose, it is a comment on the current resolution of Issue-35 which neglects that the purpose of SPARQL Service Description is less than is needed to address the issue
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Jeremy J Carroll
> Principal Architect
> Syapse, Inc.
>
>
>
>
>

Received on Wednesday, 21 August 2013 17:11:59 UTC