Editors: consistent use of terms in webont docs

I realize after looking at my own notes on the editor's breakout that I 
didn't explain my notation.  Here it is in more readable form:

The editors agreed that we should be more consistent about the terms used 
in the webont documents.  We identified common confusing and overloaded 
terms, and decided on a uniform meaning to be used in our documents.  Some 
of these decisions were simply arbitrary, some were driven by accepted use 
in other W3C groups.

We also decided not to use the word "axiom" in the overview or the guide, 
but that it was OK in the reference document.  We didn't discuss the 
requirements document.

Do Not Use:
--------------------
object
class member
knowledge base
symbol
term
name


Use with consistent meaning:
-------------------------------------------
resource: RDF resources
instance: the relation between an individual and a class
individual: an instance of a class
ontology: the import closure of documents (Note that an ontology is 
ANYTHING WRITTEN IN OWL)
document: in the web sense - something with a URL (Note that document and 
ontology should not be confused.  An ontology may span documents)
element: in the XML sense
entity: in the XML sense
attribute: in the  XML sense
node: in the RDF sense
component or peice: for parts of a definition e.g. the arguments to 
intersection-of in a class definition
URI reference: instead of "name of object"  for referring to something 
named
Language Construct: things like OWL:Class, OWL:intersection.  These are 
also URI references.
vocabulary: in the RDF model theory sense (a set of URI refs)
class: in the OWL sense, as a language construct
concept: informal term for the abstractions "in the world" that classes 
denote
 type: in the RDF sense - the instance relation
class expression: any use of the Class construct to express an axiom 
class definition:  INFORMAL term for talking about an owl:class tag and 
its pieces
property defintion: INFORMAL term for talking about an owl:class tag and 
its pieces
set: in the mathematical sense
statement: An open tag, it's close tag, and everything in between.  E.g. 
"import statement"
restriction: usually a peice of a class expression, a statement that 
expresses a constraint, local by default
local restriction 
global restriction: reserved only for discussions of property domain and 
range
constraint: Informal term for discussing the effect of a restriction


-Chris

Dr. Christopher A. Welty, Knowledge Structures Group
IBM Watson Research Center, 19 Skyline Dr.
Hawthorne, NY  10532     USA 
Voice: +1 914.784.7055,  IBM T/L: 863.7055
Fax: +1 914.784.6078, Email: welty@us.ibm.com

Received on Sunday, 12 January 2003 17:08:00 UTC