Thoughts on @src becoming equivalent to @about

I have no major issues with @src behaving like @about. I'd vote for it
if it came to that.

I didn't really hear anybody that was largely opposed to the idea on the
call last week, either. Just to clarify, the reason I think we are doing
this is so that we can apply @instanceof to @src.

With the current processing rules (please correct me if this is wrong):

Simple example (CURRENT RULES):
-----------------------------------------------------------------
<div about="#me">
   <img rel="foaf:depiction" src="http://example.org/me.png" />
</div>
--------
<#me> foaf:depiction <http://example.org/me.png> .
-----------------------------------------------------------------

However, this is problematic (CURRENT RULES):
-----------------------------------------------------------------
<div about="#me">
   <img instanceof="foaf:Image" rel="foaf:depiction"
        src="http://example.org/me.png" />
</div>
--------
<_:bn0> rdf:type foaf:Image .
<_:bn0> foaf:depiction <http://example.org/me.png> .
-----------------------------------------------------------------

By making @src behave like @about, we can do the problematic markup
above, like so (PROPOSED RULES):
-----------------------------------------------------------------
<img src="http://example.org/me.png" instanceof="foaf:Image"
     rev="foaf:depiction" property="#me" />
--------
<http://example.org/me.png> rdf:type foaf:Image .
<#me> foaf:depiction <http://example.org/me.png> .
-----------------------------------------------------------------

We do lose out on the ability to do this, though (CURRENT RULES):
-----------------------------------------------------------------
<div about="#me">
   <img rel="foaf:depiction" src="http://example.org/me.png"/>
</div>
--------
<#me> foaf:depiction <http://example.org/me.png> .
-----------------------------------------------------------------

I don't see that as a huge loss, because we can always do this, with the
added benefit of being able to do @instanceof (PROPOSED RULES):
-----------------------------------------------------------------
<div about="#me" rel="foaf:depiction">
   <img src="http://example.org/me.png" instanceof="foaf:Image" />
</div>
--------
<#me> foaf:depiction <http://example.org/me.png> .
<http://example.org/me.png> rdf:type foaf:Image .
-----------------------------------------------------------------

-- manu

-- 
Manu Sporny
President/CEO - Digital Bazaar, Inc.
blog: Intro to the Semantic Web in 6 minutes (video)
http://blog.digitalbazaar.com/2007/12/26/semantic-web-intro

Received on Monday, 21 January 2008 19:56:44 UTC