Issue: Request support for adding a new unique name in a collection

In response to the previous issue 5.18 Unique Names Assumption Support
in OWL [1], we have added a partial solution with the notion of
allDifferent [2].
AllDifferent allows one to make a collection of distinct members.

Currently in OWL DL and OWL Lite, if an allDifferent collection has been
created and one wants to add a new distinct member, one would need to
create the new individual and then also make a new inclusive
allDifferent statement including the new individual and all of the other
individuals from which it is different.  This message requests a more
convenient syntax for adding one new member to the collection.

As an example, consider the initial collection (of wineries as in the
example in the Guide document):
<owl:AllDifferent>
<owl:distinctMembers rdf:parsetType="Collection">
  <ex:Person rdf:about="Marietta" />
  <ex:Person rdf:about="Bancroft" />
  <ex:Person rdf:about="Forman" />
  <ex:Person rdf:about="Beringer" />
 </owl:distinctMembers>
<owl:AllDifferent>

If one wanted to add one new winery that was distinct, one would need to
make the new winery and then make a new all different statement
containing it and all of the previous terms.

<owl:AllDifferent>
<owl:distinctMembers rdf:parsetType="Collection">
  <ex:Person rdf:about="Marietta" />
  <ex:Person rdf:about="Bancroft" />
  <ex:Person rdf:about="Forman" />
  <ex:Person rdf:about="Beringer" />
  <ex:Person rdf:about="NewWinery" />
 </owl:distinctMembers>
<owl:AllDifferent>

When collections are large, creating the updated large collection
statement is inconvenient and it would be preferable to add a more
concise syntax for the addition.

This issue was raised in response to discussions at both the Manchester
f2f meeting and the  Jan 16 webont telecon.

[1]
http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/WebOnt/webont-issues.html#I5.18-Unique-Names-Assumption-Support-in-OWL

[2] http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/www-webont-wg/2003Jan/0181.html


--
 Deborah L. McGuinness
 Knowledge Systems Laboratory
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 Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305-9020
 email: dlm@ksl.stanford.edu
 URL: http://ksl.stanford.edu/people/dlm
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801 705 0941

Received on Thursday, 16 January 2003 13:51:51 UTC