Re: Union or not union for the default graph...

Andy,

On Apr 13, 2012, at 12:43 , Andy Seaborne wrote:

> 
> 
> On 13/04/12 08:02, Ivan Herman wrote:
>> My problem with this is that it becomes a closed possibility provided
>> by the store, and not the choice of the dataset provider. I mean: the
>> SPARQL service description tells me about the default dataset at the
>> SPARQL endpoint. Is there a way to tell the SPARQL engine to use or
>> not to use the union of the graphs that are in a specific SPARQL
>> query>
>> 
>> What am looking for is a way to tell the system: this is what I want.
>> Do I want a quoting or a union semantics for my particular dataset?
> 
> Aside from the efficiency, put all the triples from the named graphs into the default graph.  That tells system :-)  Seriously this feels like a system config issue, not an architectural issue.
> 
> David write:
> >> Perhaps we should provide a standard way for an RDF system
> >> to advertise how the default graph.
> 
> and that is what SPARQL SD does for SPARQL endpoints.
> 
> 
> So if the store does not do what the dataset provider wants, they ought to go to a different store. Many systems offer one mode or the other, not a choice, and it goes deep, right down to the bytes-on-disk.
> 
> So the data publisher makes the data user an offer via the endpoint and service description.
> 
> If the data user wants something different, don't take the offer made by the publisher.  The data user is now taking the responsibility for the meaning of the default graph.  So it might have to pull the named graph data into a local system that does what it wants.
> 
> Some systems allow you to "name" the union-of-named-graphs, as a virtual graph (without recursion!).  That's not standard; it's a bit of a hack of naming.
> 
> In practice, there can more choices: pick a few graphs out of a large collection and query over the union of those.  pick all but certain graphs or intersections or ...  Once you formalise the union-default-graph, it seems a small step to allowing other combinations as well.
> 
> 
> There is an efficiency thing: the data publisher might wish to say "and by the way, make default graph the union" in a TriG simply to avoid repeating all the triples if written out long form.

Is there some accepted syntax for something like that? Or do we have to come up with this?

Ivan


> 
> 	Andy
> 


----
Ivan Herman, W3C Semantic Web Activity Lead
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