[tdwg-tag] string literals vs. uris for dwc:recordedBy, dwc:identifiedBy, and dwc:georeferencedBy in RDF

Kevin Richards RichardsK at landcareresearch.co.nz
Wed May 19 23:41:51 CEST 2010


>>>From my understanding (and after reading the example Bob referred to), the difference is:

[referring to external id]
<dwc:recordedBy rdf:resource="http://people.vanderbilt.edu/~steve.baskauf/foaf.rdf#me" />

[inline text]
<dwc:recordedBy>Steve Baskauf</dwc:recordedBy>

Look right?

Kevin

-----Original Message-----
From: tdwg-tag-bounces at lists.tdwg.org [mailto:tdwg-tag-bounces at lists.tdwg.org] On Behalf Of Jim Croft
Sent: Thursday, 20 May 2010 9:37 a.m.
To: Bob Morris
Cc: tdwg-tag at lists.tdwg.org
Subject: Re: [tdwg-tag] string literals vs. uris for dwc:recordedBy, dwc:identifiedBy, and dwc:georeferencedBy in RDF

Hi Bob - should the same term allow both types of content, or should
there be a different term for each?  Does it matter?  Should
applications be smart enough to tell the difference and know what to
do with it?

Not really asking what the specification says, but about purity and
wholesomeness of design... :)

jim

On Thu, May 20, 2010 at 4:26 AM, Bob Morris <morris.bob at gmail.com> wrote:
> Exactly this example is given in
> http://web4.w3.org/TR/REC-rdf-syntax/#section-Syntax-property-attributes
> so I would find it regrettable if DwC does something somewhere that
> makes this substitution impossible or discouraged,  or encourages tool
> construction that does so, or encourages documention be interpreted in
> a way that does so.
>
> Indeed http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/rdf/dwcterms.rdf defines its type to be
> rdf:Property and is silent on any semantics  but that. My own
> conclusion is that neither the intent or the outcome of the rdf
> version of dwcterms discourages what you want, though I suppose the
> intent part would be clearer if the documentation also said that a URI
> can always be used, but applications are responsible for interpreting
> it.
>
>
> On Wed, May 19, 2010 at 11:09 AM, Steve Baskauf
> <steve.baskauf at vanderbilt.edu> wrote:
>> The definition for the Darwin Core term recordedBy
>> http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/index.htm#recordedBy
>> says "A list (concatenated and separated) of names ...".  The examples
>> given are string literals.  However, when using this term as a predicate
>> in RDF, it would seem preferable to use a URI to an RDF representation
>> of the entity (if one exists) rather than a string literal.  For
>> example, can I use:
>> <dwc:recordedBy
>> rdf:resource="http://people.vanderbilt.edu/~steve.baskauf/foaf.rdf#me"/>
>> rather than
>> <dwc:recordedBy>Steven J. Baskauf</dwc:recordedBy>
>> ?
>>
>> Steve Baskauf
>> --
>>
>> Steven J. Baskauf, Ph.D., Senior Lecturer
>> Vanderbilt University Dept. of Biological Sciences
>>
>> postal mail address:
>> VU Station B 351634
>> Nashville, TN  37235-1634,  U.S.A.
>>
>> delivery address:
>> 2125 Stevenson Center
>> 1161 21st Ave., S.
>> Nashville, TN 37235
>>
>> office: 2128 Stevenson Center
>> phone: (615) 343-4582,  fax: (615) 343-6707
>> http://bioimages.vanderbilt.edu
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> tdwg-tag mailing list
>> tdwg-tag at lists.tdwg.org
>> http://lists.tdwg.org/mailman/listinfo/tdwg-tag
>>
>>
>
>
>
> --
> Robert A. Morris
> Emeritus Professor  of Computer Science
> UMASS-Boston
> 100 Morrissey Blvd
> Boston, MA 02125-3390
> Associate, Harvard University Herbaria
> email: ram at cs.umb.edu
> web: http://bdei.cs.umb.edu/
> web: http://etaxonomy.org/FilteredPush
> http://www.cs.umb.edu/~ram
> phone (+1)617 287 6466
> _______________________________________________
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>



--
_________________
Jim Croft ~ jim.croft at gmail.com ~ +61-2-62509499 ~
http://www.google.com/profiles/jim.croft
'A civilized society is one which tolerates eccentricity to the point
of doubtful sanity.'
 - Robert Frost, poet (1874-1963)
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