RE: rdfms-resource-semantics

On Thu, 7 Jun 2001, Lee Jonas wrote:

>All this confusion over 'resource' (RFC2396 sense) and 'resource' (RDF
>sense) is precisely why I advocate eliminating the inconsistent definition
>of 'resource' altogether from the RDF M&S spec.

But we do need a name for what is being described. If it's 'resource', we
need to emphasize that it's not an RFC2396 resource. If it's something else,
it has to be defined as something identified by a URI reference.

>Hence I suggest that the RDF spec should be changed to say that triples
>describe whatever can be referenced by a URI reference - i.e. a 'view' or a
>'part' of the resource identified by the URI.  At the end of the day, RDF
>semantics would remain unchanged: triples (p, s, o) where 'p' & 's', and
>optionally 'o', are URI references.

My thoughts exactly. One source of the confusion is that nobody has given a
name to whatever it is that URI references point to. As we need to speak
about the thing, RDF co-opts 'resource'. Someone suggested entity. At the
end of the day, it doesn't really matter as long as people understand that
RDF points by URI *references* and the things described aren't the same as
RFC2396 'resources' even if RDF is the 'resource description framework'.

Sampo Syreeni, aka decoy, mailto:decoy@iki.fi, gsm: +358-50-5756111
student/math+cs/helsinki university, http://www.iki.fi/~decoy/front

Received on Thursday, 7 June 2001 08:52:09 UTC