Re: Attention Users! (RDF Core WG Decisions)

> The RDF Core Working Group is making decisions that directly 
> affect your software and your documents. I (personally) feel it 
> is extremely important to keep you abreast of these decisions. 
> While we have agreed upon the following, it is not yet set in 
> stone, and your comments may guide us in the future or cause us 
> to reconsider our decisions.
> 
> ** Current Decisions
> 
> rdf-ns-prefix-confusion
> 
> On 25th May 2001, the WG decided that ALL attributes must be 
> namespace qualified. There is a description of the decision, 
> including detail on the grammar productions affected and a 
> collection of test cases.
> 
> Info: http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/w3c-rdfcore-
> wg/2001May/0278.html
> Tests: http://ilrt.org/people/cmdjb/2001/05/rdf-ns-prefix-confusion/

I mildly disagree.  The main problem is with the namespace spec, which lets 
the matter float about with its vague notions of "global attributes", but I 
think precedence in other specs such as XSLT suggests that RDF should only 
require the qualification within elements not in the RDF namespace, and in 
fact that the qualification should be forbidden on attributes of elements in 
the RDF namespace.

> rdfms-abouteachprefix
> 
> On 1st June 2001, the WG decided that aboutEachPrefix would be 
> removed from the RDF Model and Syntax Recommendation on the 
> grounds that there is a lack of implementation experience, and 
> it therefore should not be in the recommendation. A future 
> version of RDF may consider support for this feature.

Strongly agreed.

> rdfms-empty-property-elements
> 
> On 8th June 2001 the WG decided how empty property elements 
> should be interpreted. The decision is fully represented by the 
> test cases.
> 
> Tests: http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/w3c-rdfcore-
> wg/2001Jun/0134.html

Seems reasonable to me.

> rdf-containers-formalmodel
> 
> On 8th June 2001 the WG decided that an RDF model may contain 
> partial descriptions of a container. Thus an RDF model is not 
> contrained to have the containermembership properties contiguous 
> starting from rdf:_1.

I do wish a more radical reformation of containers could be undertaken.


-- 
Uche Ogbuji                               Principal Consultant
uche.ogbuji@fourthought.com               +1 303 583 9900 x 101
Fourthought, Inc.                         http://Fourthought.com 
4735 East Walnut St, Ste. C, Boulder, CO 80301-2537, USA
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Received on Thursday, 5 July 2001 13:51:39 UTC