Re: RDF, RDFS, and OWL language constructs

On Mon, 18 Apr 2005 22:31:12 +0200, Hans Teijgeler  
<hans.teijgeler@quicknet.nl> wrote:

> Hi Frank!
> Thanks for the help!
> It seems to me that we have a divide between two Semantic Webs:
>
> * RDF + RDFS + OWL Full (the cumulation I mentioned: "OWL Full
> contains all the OWL language constructs and provides free, unconstrained
> use of RDF constructs.")
> * OWL DL and its subset OWL Lite

Sort of. Since the difference is actually based on whether you use certain  
terms defined in the specs, it is not that different to saying we workin  
lots of different semantic webs, depending on how much of the specs are  
implemented by your parser.

> There is a lot in OWL DL that I like, but using OWL DL means de facto
> throwing away RDF-RDFS (right?), and that seems not so nice.

It doesn't mean throwing it away, it means using it in a way that is  
designed to make sure things are decidable... You could do this without  
OWL, actually.

> It appears to me that this divide now forces us to make a very important
> choice between the two, where I had expected a smooth upgrade path RDF >
> RDFS > OWL Lite > OWL DL > OWL Full. Too logical (or naive), I presume.
> Is there any way, e.g. a header, to tell the software whether you work  
> in DL or in Full?

Well, the software is the limiting factor. If you find a certain set of  
terms, or a certain idiom, then you are working in Full, and if your  
processor doesn't handle all of OWL, then it should check for things it  
can't do at the very least. I believe there are also systems that will  
tell you whether your code is DL or Lite.

cheers

Chaals

> Is there anything written on a migration path between the two in either
> direction?
> Regards,
> Hans



-- 
Charles McCathieNevile                      Fundacion Sidar
charles@sidar.org   +61 409 134 136    http://www.sidar.org

Received on Saturday, 23 April 2005 17:45:48 UTC