- From: Martyn Horner <martyn.horner@profium.com>
- Date: Tue, 08 May 2001 09:21:26 +0200
- To: w3c-rdfcore-wg@w3.org
http://www.w3.org/2000/03/rdf-tracking/Overview.html#rdfms-resource-semantics I got back to my desk yesterday to start pondering the resource semantic issue. I sketched out a review of what other people have said on the subject but then I got immersed in the discussion here on `truth' and `provenance'. It's clear that the definition of resource in the M&S spec is intended to be a `fundamental' definition from which the rest can be built. It's clear also that there's a question whether a `resource' as understood in RDF represents the bit-sequence (or the actual atoms) of a referenced entity or some sort of pledged token of good intent towards an significantly-invariant object. I wonder, given the need to emphasise the legal aspects of RDF assertion, whether we don't need to define resources reflexively to support this. I was playing with a definition along the lines of `a token for an object constrained in a set of dimensions expressed by a set of properties and values but otherwise capable of redefinition'. There's a musing somewhere which talks about successive degress of specificity in a web reference. Using `isVersionOf' and `isLanguageSpecificVersionOf' allows resources to inherent a set of dimensional constraints from another resource or to have them selectively relaxed. It seems to me that, to reflect the spirit of the Semantic Web, we should help to define the handles on the system in ways that allow (and encourage) fullfillment rather than impose limitations. Defining resources by their role in RDF (and not RDF as a process on resources) both expresses the spirit and allows a rigorous `external' description of `assertion'. It means that `resources' get an RDF-specific definition. I guess I'm trying to permit the `resource is as resource does' definition while explicitly allowing textual change behind the URI. URIs need not stand for a fixed set of atoms, but they must serve to support assertions (and essentially, only that). (I got caught by this this week. The page at http://blogspace.com/rdf/mimetype got changed during the discussion before I could read the first emails that suggested it needed changing. Very confusing. I guess that's OK... :-) This also lets in a possibility of resource equivalence in that two URIs could be described as equivalent (as mirrors) while physically separate. This means that RDF could be used (must be used) to express `canonicality' of URIs (one is the master, the other the derivative). Please comment before I begin another spiral... By the way, http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/www-rdf-interest/2001Apr/0027.html (by Dan Connolly) has some good sense on the subject: `URIs mean what we all agree that they mean' Resource identification is a `social and contractual issue' (http://www.w3.org/DesignIssues/NameMyth). That links the two issues nicely. -- Martyn Horner <martyn.horner@profium.com> Profium (former name Pro Solutions), Les Espaces de Sophia, Immeuble Delta, B.P. 037, F-06901 Sophia-Antipolis, France Tel. +33 (0)4.93.95.31.44 Fax. +33 (0)4.93.95.52.58 Mob. +33 (0)6.21.01.54.56 Internet: http://www.profium.com
Received on Tuesday, 8 May 2001 03:21:22 UTC