- From: Patrick Stickler <patrick.stickler@nokia.com>
- Date: Sun, 03 Feb 2002 20:06:02 +0200
- To: ext Jos De_Roo <jos.deroo.jd@belgium.agfa.com>
- CC: RDF Core <w3c-rdfcore-wg@w3.org>
[Response primarily for Jos, others feel free to skip] On 2002-02-03 15:22, "ext Jos De_Roo" <jos.deroo.jd@belgium.agfa.com> wrote: >> There is already alot of negative opinion about >> how the RDF datatyping proposals are referencing >> XML Schema datatype URIs. I suspect that any >> solution that uses anything other than the pre- >> defined (or user defined) single URIs for each >> datatype will not be acceptable. > > but this is meant for machines, no? Humans will not be left out of the loop, and lots of humans will be expressing knowledge manually in RDF/XML even if assisted by an XML editor. Ideally, yes, RDF is meant for machines, but we do not yet live in an ideal world. Complexity is also an issue for programmers who need to create applications that will allow machines to work with RDF encoded knowledge. >> I think one key difference between the TDL and >> S "philosophies" is that S wants/needs to use a >> unique URI for each component of a datatype >> in order to make the significance of those components >> explicit in the representation, whereas TDL uses the >> single URI of a datatype to define a context within >> which the MT provides a consistent interpretation for >> the lexical form (literal). > > if you (in TDL-global) only have the fact :Jenny :age "30" > and *no* range information for :age then you have *no* > interpretation for "30" Correct, insofar as the RDF expressed knowledge is concerned. But how does that change the validity or applicability of a TDL interpretation? The literal is either a typed data literal or not. If it is, then the literal is a lexical form for some unknown datatype. Perhaps in the next second, an RDF schema with the needed datatyping information will be loaded -- or perhaps the absence of any determinable type will lead the application to go looking for a schema that provides it. It's not a shortcoming of TDL that the type is not known. How is the situation any different for S? >> Multiple URIs, synonymous idiom-specific vocabularies, >> etc. etc. may make the MT easier to write, but it >> makes life in general much harder for the user, and >> after all, at the end of the day, if RDF datatyping >> is percieved to be too complicated, regardless of >> how beautiful and correct the MT is, folks won't use >> it. Eh? > > I don't think it makes life for machines any harder See comment above. Humans have to express the knowledge. Humans have to create the systems to use that knowledge. Humans are the end benefactors of productive use of that knowledge. Humans are in the loop everywhere. Please forgive me if I seem to be treating anyone as naiive about this -- I doubt if any of the WG members do not fully understand and appreciate the human element in all this, though it does seem that some give it more focus and consideration than others. Cheers, Patrick -- Patrick Stickler Phone: +358 50 483 9453 Senior Research Scientist Fax: +358 7180 35409 Nokia Research Center Email: patrick.stickler@nokia.com
Received on Sunday, 3 February 2002 13:05:32 UTC