re: RIF notation for use of URI/IRI as symbol?

Dear Dan,

This is a response to your comment [1] on RIF.

> This surprises me;
>
> Table 1. Correspondence between RDF and RIF symbols.
>  RDF Symbol Example RIF Symbol Example
>  Absolute IRI <http://www.w3.org/2007/rif> Absolute IRI
> "http://www.w3.org/2007/rif"^^rif:iri
>
>  -- http://www.w3.org/TR/2008/WD-rif-rdf-owl-20080415/
>
> The notation <http://www.w3.org/2007/rif> in turtle, N3,
> and SPARQL is *use* of a symbol, where
> "http://www.w3.org/2007/rif"^^rif:iri is *mention*
> of a symbol.
>
> RIF seems to be using "http://www.w3.org/2007/rif"^^rif:iri
> for use of a symbol.
>
> Am I reading that right?

Both <http://www.w3.org/2007/rif> and
"http://www.w3.org/2007/rif"^^rif:iri are ways of writing IRIs in the
syntax. And, like in RDF, IRIs are uninterpreted symbols in RIF, i.e.,
the same IRI can be interpreted differently in different
interpretations. Perhaps it is helpful at this point to clarify that
rif:iri is a symbol space (i.e., a set of symbols), but not a datatype.
A symbol space is like a datatype, but the value space and
lexical-to-value mapping are optional (and not present in the case of
rif:iri).

Finally, it has been decided that we will use
<http://www.w3.org/2007/rif> as a shortcut for
"http://www.w3.org/2007/rif"^^rif:iri in the syntax, and that further
explanatory text will be included in the RDF and OWL compatibility
document (see [2]).

does this address your concern?


Best, Jos, on behalf of the RIF working group


[1]
http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-rif-comments/2008May/0000.html
[2]
http://www.w3.org/2005/rules/wiki/SWC#Symbols_in_RIF_Versus_RDF.2FOWL_.28Informative.29 


-- 
Jos de Bruijn            debruijn@inf.unibz.it
+390471016224         http://www.debruijn.net/
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Received on Monday, 2 June 2008 12:37:28 UTC