Re: [office-metadata] Focus on model

[Bruce D'Arcus <bdarcus@gmail.com>]

Hi Lars,

On Dec 14, 2006, at 9:39 AM, Lars Oppermann wrote:

> Consider the statement
>
> {the_fragment-called_A; was_authored_by"; "John Smith"}
> {the_fragment-called_A; was_authored_by"; "John Smith"}
>
> Assuming document content like this
>
> <t:span xml:id="A">blah blah blah</t:span>
>
> This could be encoded in an RDF/XML-like fashion as already noted like 
> this:
>
> <rdf:RDF>
>   <rdf:Description rdf:about="#A">
>     <dc:author>John Smith</dc:author>
>   </rdf:Description>
> </rdf:RDF>

Yes. But the subject in that case can only be the document fragment 
identified by the xml:id.

> From what I understood from the ongoing discussion, it is not yet 
> clear how this can be done, if the "resource" 'Jonh Smith' is to 
> appear as part of the document content, so as to avoid any redundancy.

I'd modify the language a little to "if the 'property' is to appear 
..." where property is a predicate/object couple.

> Consider we have content as this:
>
> <t:span xml:id="A">blah blah blah</t:span>
> <t:span xml:id="B">John Smith</t:span>
> <t:span xml:id="C">14 December 2006</t:span>
>
> We can reformulate the previous RDF/XML example to read as follows:
>
> <rdf:RDF>
>   <rdf:Description rdf:about="#A">
>     <dc:author rdf:resource="#B">
>     <dc:date rdf:resource="#C">
>   </rdf:Description>
> </rdf:RDF>
>
> What use-cases can't be implemented by this simplistic approach? Why 
> is there a need to introduce anything beyond a mechanism for referring 
> to fragments into the content?

Hmm ... thanks for the example and the clear separation of model and 
encoding :-)

Your above model is not formally equivalent to what you have at the 
top. What you have there is:

<#A> dc:author <#B> .
<#A> dc:date <#C> .
<#B> rdf:value "John Smith" .
<#C> rdf:value "14 December 2006" .

Also, it's not clear how you're establishing the subject.

By contrast, I would expect a model like:

<#A> dc:author "John Smith" .
<#A> dc:date "2006-12-14" .

... which CAN be encoded like:

<p about="A">
   <span property="dc:author">John Smith</span>
   <span property="dc:date">2006-12-14</span>
</p>

Bruce