Re: Intellidimension RDF Gateway Package for URI Query Agent (URIQA) Specification

Hi Derrish,

Just got back from vacation, which is why I didn't respond immediately.

I'm very happy to see you folks implementing the URIQA solution, and will
definitely be downloading the RDF Gateway to try it out. It actually looks
exactly like what we need for the production version of the Nokia
SW Server (the present incarnation is a prototype/pilot version that I
wouldn't necessarily consider "enterprise ready" ;-)

I've got a few preliminary comments/questions (more sure to be coming):

1. One thing I noted when going through the online documentation for your
URIQA package, in the definition

function Package_OnPutDescription()
{
    if (Request.serverVariables["HTTP_URI_RESOLUTION_MODE"] !=
"Description")
    {
        Response.statusCode = 501;
        return; // Not a URIQA request
    }

    // Get the URI of the resource from the request
    var id = new Resource(Request.serverVariables["REQUEST_URL"]);

    // Read the resource description from the request and parse the contents
    // as RDF/XML using the Inet data service.
    var data = Request.binaryRead();

    var ds = new DataSource("inet?parsetype=rdf&src=" +
Server.urlEncode(data));

    // Add only the statements about the resource to the description table.
    var rs = (INSERT {?p ?s ?o} INTO uriqa USING #ds RULEBASE uriqa
        WHERE (?s=#id OR getAnon(#id, ?s)) AND {?p ?s ?o});

    Response.addHeader("URI-Resolution-Mode", "Description");
}

your implementation would fail to commit any reifications or
statements about any anonymous node values.
Ideally, there would exist as part of the URIQA package, a generic
method akin to getDescription() in my Java implementation, which
given a URI and a knowledge base, would extract a concise bounded
description of the resource from the knowledge base. The input RDF/XML
could then be parsed and loaded into a temporary knowledge base, the
description extracted, and then committed to the persistent knowledge
base. Of course, that same function would find use throughout all of
the URIQA defined behavior of the package, for the other methods as well.

2. Does/Will the RDF Gateway provide for the equivalent of servlets,
where I can map a particular URI prefix to a function? I see that RSPs
act that way, but I wouldn't want to tie that behavior to a particular
syntax. I.e., can one have http://sw.nokia.com/foo be bound to a script
so that http://sw.nokia.com/foo?bar=blargh would be executed as a call
to foo(bar=blargh)?

If http://sw.nokia.com/foo is an RDFQL script, will the server execute
that script when the request URI is http://sw.nokia.com/foo?bar=blargh?

3. Does RDF Gateway already provide, or would it be difficult to provide
a means to filter query results based on security considerations? E.g.
rather than flag an error and return nothing if a given user does not
have the right to view a few statements in the results, simply filter
out all statements that are disallowed by their access rights when returning
the results. One thing we do in the Nokia ontologies is qualify particular
resources by confidentiality or even explicit access rights, and ideally
the query processes would work the same for all users for all knowledge,
differing only in what is allowed to be exposed to the user. Given the
complexity of our ontologies, it would be prohibitively burdensome to
try to manage accessibility per source, knowledgebase, server, etc.

For general querying of knowledge, there would ideally be a single final
filtering phase which would strip out all statements having resources
the user is not authorized to see.

That's all for now ;-)

Cheers,

Patrick

PS: Is Intellidimension a member of the W3C? If so, would you folks be
interested in partnering with Nokia in publishing a W3C Note promoting
URIQA?


----- Original Message -----
From: "ext Derrish Repchick" <drepchick@intellidimension.com>
To: <www-rdf-interest@w3.org>
Sent: 23 June, 2003 16:03
Subject: Intellidimension RDF Gateway Package for URI Query Agent (URIQA)
Specification


>
> Intellidimension recently released a Package for RDF Gateway that
implements
> the Nokia URI Query Agent (URIQA) Specification (see
> http://sw.nokia.com/URIQA.html). This RDF Gateway Package allows an agent
to
> query and modify the RDF-based description of a web resource using HTTP.
>
> A complete description of the RDF Gateway Package can be found at:
>
> http://www.intellidimension.com/pages/site/packages/uriqa/default.rsp
>
> The Package requires RDF Gateway version 1.0.2
>
> http://www.intellidimension.com/pages/site/products/rdfgateway.rsp
>
>
> Derrish Repchick
> Intellidimension Inc
> www.intellidimension.com
>
>

Received on Tuesday, 1 July 2003 10:25:19 UTC