RDF Question: about syntax of rdf container objects (Bag, Alt, Seq)

[Dan Brickley]

yOn Thu, 8 Apr 1999, Roger L. Costello wrote:

> Dan Brickley wrote:
> > 
> > Having an rdf:type property pointing to rdf:Bag is just RDF's way of
> > telling us that the anonymous resource "is A" rdf:Bag. 
> >
> 
> Is it *always* the case that if an RDF model has a resource with a
> property rdf:type whose value is foo then rather than:
> 
> <rdf:Description [attrs]>
>     <rdf:type resoure="foo">
>     [other properties]
> </rdf:Description>
> 
> the syntax is:
> 
> <foo>
>    [other properties]
> </foo>
> 
> Example:
> 
> Rather than:
> 
> <rdf:Description >
>     <rdf:type resoure="rdf:Bag">
>     [other properties]
> </rdf:Description>
> 
> the syntax is:
> 
> <rdf:Bag>
>    [other properties]
> </rdf:Bag>
> 

Yep. From:

http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-rdf-syntax/ 2.2.2. Basic Abbreviated Syntax

	While the serialization syntax shows the structure of an RDF model most
	clearly, often it is desirable to use a more compact XML form. The RDF
	abbreviated syntax accomplishes this. As a further benefit, the abbreviated syntax
	allows documents obeying certain well-structured XML DTDs to be directly
	interpreted as RDF models.

	Three forms of abbreviation are defined for the basic serialization
	syntax. [...]

	The third basic abbreviation applies to the common case of a Description
	element containing a type property (see Section 4.1 for the meaning of
	type). In this case, the resource type defined in the schema corresponding to the
	value of the type property can be used directly as an element name.
	[...]


So, yes, a general XML/RDF parser would need to handle such cases. The
spec gives EBNF for these constructs in section 2.2.2

Dan




--
Daniel.Brickley at bristol.ac.uk                  
Institute for Learning and Research Technology http://www.ilrt.bris.ac.uk/
University of Bristol,  Bristol BS8 1TN, UK.   phone:+44(0)117-9287096


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