Re: naming properties and classes in RDF

> [...] It's a very interesting experience, as I keep running into
> problems with my own perception of how to do things.

I came across similar paradigm shifts when trying to explain RDF to
someone on #rdfig who was thinking of RDF in a time-frame POV.
Questions like "what happens when I add a new contradictory triple:
what happens to the old ones?" and so on. It was weird thinking about
it temporally, and it made me realise that RDF can't handle time all
that well.

So I guess you're having similar problems with people coming at RDF
through GUI interfaces for creating RDF, from the questions that you
raise.

> - if items don't have uris, where do you get them from if you're
> not a programmer?

Perhaps if you don't want to have to come up with a new URI... well,
you could do one of three things:-

* Use a bNode
* Use a UUID of some sort
* Promt for a URI prefix of some sort, and then use that as the base
of some generated IDs.

> - generally, if you're creating instance data, how is it best to
> avoid mistakes and confusion?

Well, this is RDF, so you should be able to produce filters and rules
that can flag inconsistencies. I did quite a bit of work on that with
my RDF Lint [1] stuff, and even applied it to EARL. I know that DanC
and TimBL were also working on some schema and instance data checking
rules, but I'm not sure where that went, or if they applied them to
any practical use (I'll bet they did).

[...]
> - how do you explain to people how best they should create
> RDF instance data (things like the apparent redundancy in the
> example I gave)?
>
> - how do you divide up the problem so you can create
> manageable qualtities of data at a time that aren't too
> confusing?

I guess that you just have to learn by doing: I found that N3 is a
valuable tool in creating data quickly, but I'm sure that everyone
will have their own preferences. N3, GUI, or whatever, they all have
their advantages and disadvantages... perhaps it would be nice to list
some of those, but of course, when you're using the technologies, you
rarely want to document how you used them so that others can learn
from what you've done.

[1] http://infomesh.net/2001/05/rdflint/

--
Kindest Regards,
Sean B. Palmer
@prefix : <http://webns.net/roughterms/> .
:Sean :hasHomepage <http://purl.org/net/sbp/> .

Received on Friday, 16 November 2001 12:59:30 UTC