RE: heading toward datatyping telecon

> There seem to be three fundamentally different approaches in 
> play.  They all 
> have in common that a literal value, e.g. an integer, is 
> denoted by a node in 
> the graph.  They differ on whether an arc from that node, 
> labelled with 
> rdf:type, takes a value which denotes a value space or a 
> datatype (Pat's use of 
> the term datatype i.e. as defined in XSD a tuple defining 
> lexical space, value 
> space and facets).
> 
> All I was originally trying to say is that programmers, and 
> some of the time I 
> am one, are used to the type of something denoting the value 
> space alone.
> 
> Brian

It is true that programmers are used to dealing primarily
only with the value spaces, but that is because the lexical
forms of values are not preserved, but only a means to an
end, that end being a canonical internal representation of 
the value.

Since RDF preserves the lexical form, we cannot enjoy such
a convenience. At least not at the RDF level.

Perhaps in the future, we will have logical levels that
will provide such transparency of lexical form, just as
we envision having transparency of ontological terms with
equivalent semantics, but that is not going to happen at
the RDF (i.e. graph) level itself.

So the solutions that we come up with must at least preserve
the needed information for interpreting the lexical forms
of literals as well as organize that information in a consistent
manner for the sake of implementation.

Right?

Patrick

Received on Tuesday, 6 November 2001 10:23:12 UTC