Re: Alternatives to containers/collections (was Re: Requirements for a possible "RDF 2.0")

On Thu, Jan 14, 2010 at 4:20 PM, Pat Hayes <phayes@ihmc.us> wrote:
> A lot, perhaps all, of this hair could be avoided if RDF allowed general
> tuples as well as triples. All that is needed is some way to put N things
> into a sequence: so, put N things into a sequence. The 'graph model' would
> be a hyperlink, drawn as a polygon (eg triangle for N=3) rather than a line.
> In triples-style syntax, it would just be moving a dot.

I periodically wonder what an RDF without the binary restriction would
look like.

Would each property/relation have a fixed arity, eg. dc:source might
'be a 4', 'foaf:knows' a 7? That doesn't make a lot of sense to me. So
presumably they'd vary freely. In which case, we have a lot of
figuring out to do when wondering whether   livesWith(alice, bob,
2007, 'y') implies livesWith(alice,bob) or livesWith(alice, bob, 'y',
'foo.html'). The binary straightjacket makes some of these questions
impossible, albeit maddeningly...

Dan