- From: Simon Spero <sesuncedu@gmail.com>
- Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2008 11:09:46 -0500
- To: Antoine Isaac <aisaac@few.vu.nl>
- Cc: SKOS <public-esw-thes@w3.org>, SWD WG <public-swd-wg@w3.org>
Did we come to a resolution on this issue? If it has been decided to break with the standards, then the Primer and Reference need to be rewritten to make this explicit everywhere that broader and narrower are discussed. Just because an inference is possible doesn't mean that a query expansion has to follow it; the difference between BT/NT and RT is that the inference is permissible. On the other hand, making BT non-hierarchical makes it much harder to apply the principle of specificity. If a result set contains 40 documents about different kinds of rodents, most of which have different headings, non-hierarchical broader prohibits merging any headings that aren't direct siblings. Simon On Jan 14, 2008, at 12:25 PM, Antoine Isaac wrote: > Hi Simon, > >> >> >The Core guide reads >> >> > To assert that one concept is broader in meaning (i.e. more >> general) >> > than another, where the scope (meaning) of one falls completely >> within >> > the scope of the other, use the |skos:broader >> > < http://www.w3.org/2004/02/skos/core/spec/#broader>| property >> >> >The current Primer reads the same, as well as the Reference. >> I> think this is rather compatible with ISO 2788 for instance. >> >> It's 100% compatible with the standards- it's just incompatible >> with intransitive broader. :) >> >> Any intransitive broader must feature at least some cases of >> partial overlap. > > I think I can understand your point. To me, however, what is > important is user satisfaction. And if I can find somewhere a SKOS > users that are not happy with transitivity of broader, this ruins > the idea of having it generally transitive. > Examples most often encountered are: > - KOS designers that do not "support" the kind of inference that > transitivity would imply for their KOS, for whatever reasons (even > if in the loop that forces them to acknowledge that their hierarchy > is dirtier than what they would hope for) > - KOS consumers (e.g. designers of user interface) that do not like > the idea of having inferences that ruin the structure as it was > defined. In information retrieval it is acknowledged that the value > of items retrieved "decreases" when you expand queries using the > hierarchy: it can be quite ok if you expand using the > specializations that are one step down the initial query, much less > ok if you return a document described with a concept ten steps below > the initial query. > > Best, > > Antoine > >> >> >> Simon >> >> >> On Jan 14, 2008 11:42 AM, Antoine Isaac <aisaac@few.vu.nl <mailto:aisaac@few.vu.nl >> >> wrote: >> >> Hi Simon, >> >> The Core guide reads >> >> > To assert that one concept is broader in meaning ( i.e. more >> general) >> > than another, where the scope (meaning) of one falls completely >> within >> > the scope of the other, use the |skos:broader >> > < http://www.w3.org/2004/02/skos/core/spec/#broader>| property >> >> The current Primer reads the same, as well as the Reference. >> I think this is rather compatible with ISO 2788 for instance. >> >> Best, >> >> Antoine >> >> > On Jan 14, 2008, at 7:29 AM, Antoine Isaac wrote: >> > >> >> I'm not sure this would be 100% safe, as multiple ways of >> >> specializing skos:broader can be thought of, cf ISSUE-56 [1] >> >> And these mixes, leading to possibly confusing hierarchies for >> >> newcomers: consider the combination of "transitive"and >> "partitive" >> >> specializations. We can specialize skos.broader into >> >> skos:broaderTransitive, skos:broaderPartitive, >> >> skos:broaderTransitivePartitive. If we consider other axes of >> >> specialization (e.g. for "generic" and "instance" flavors of >> >> hierarchy) this would blur the picture even more... >> >> >> >> On the other hand, given the number of reactions we had on this >> >> transitive aspect of broader, we might just decide to introduce >> only >> >> transitiveBroader, as an acknowledgement of the interest it >> gained. >> > >> > Can somebody explain to me what 'broader' and 'narrower', >> unqualified, >> > mean now? >> > >> > Given that the whole semantics of SKOS are now completely >> undefined, >> > and that the core guide is going to have to be completely >> rewritten, >> > what do these terms mean. >> > >> > We know that they can't be *any* kind of orderings. >> > >> > We know that they can't be associative relationships, because >> > otherwise they'd just be called relationships. We know that the >> > language used in the SKOS Core Guide has previously been >> taken from >> > and aligned with Z39.19 et al, but that this is no longer >> acceptable. >> > >> > Just calling an associative relationship hierarchical does not >> make it >> > so. The LC made tried that twenty years ago. Mary >> Dykstra(1988) >> > explained the problems with this approach (if you haven't read >> this >> > article, it's very helpful background for this discussion). >> > >> > I I have no problem with SKOS being used to represent false >> claims; >> > I'm working with the LCSH, which, being of Congress, is riddled >> with >> > the things. Redefining an existing concept so as to make the >> false >> > claims become true brings in to question the whole exercise. >> 'Sorry >> > if I'm sounding like a broken record on this, but the broadening >> that >> > I'm most afraid of is the whole thing going pear-shaped. >> > >> > If having a transitive broader is too problematic, can we at >> least >> > remove unqualified broader and narrower completely? >> > >> > Simon >> > >> > [Dykstra(1988)] Mary Dykstra. LC Subject Headings Disguised as a >> > Thesaurus. /Library Journal/, 113(4):p42 –, March 1988. ISSN >> 03630277. >> > URL http://search.ebscohost
Received on Thursday, 24 January 2008 16:10:16 UTC