On 8/25/14 11:17 AM, Ruben Verborgh wrote:
bnodes are Semantic Web, but not Linked Data. If a node doesn't have a universal identifier, it cannot be addressed.I find this comment strange. If you mean that I can’t query using a bnode, then sure. If you mean that I never get any bnodes back as a result of a Linked Data URI GET, then I think not.Yes, you can get back bnodes. But the identifier of a bnode has only meaning in the document it is contained in. Hence, you cannot ask the server anything else about this bnode, because you don't have an identifier for it that exists outside of that one document.
Put differently, you have a pronoun in a document. The rule in the natural language world apply here. The term *bnode* is a bottom-up confusion vector.
Therefore, it's maybe better to not get back bnodes at all; except if the server is sure the client cannot ask further meaningful questions about them (for instance, when all triples about a bnode were already in the response, as is the case with lists, and some other situations as well).
Again, stick with the pronoun analogy [1] and the confusion should be reduced.
The more we align RDF with natural language sentences, the better for understanding, appreciation, and mass exploitation.
BTW -- I stumbled across this quote from Cyc's Doug Lenat:"Once you have a truly massive amount of information integrated as knowledge, then the human-software system will be superhuman, in the same sense that mankind with *writing is superhuman* compared to mankind before writing."
which echoes another quote by John F. Sowa:“Natural Languages are the most sophisticated systems of communication ever developed.”
Best, Ruben
Links: [1] http://www.grammar-monster.com/glossary/indefinite_pronoun.htm -- Regards, Kingsley Idehen Founder & CEO OpenLink Software Company Web: http://www.openlinksw.com Personal Weblog 1: http://kidehen.blogspot.com Personal Weblog 2: http://www.openlinksw.com/blog/~kidehen Twitter Profile: https://twitter.com/kidehen Google+ Profile: https://plus.google.com/+KingsleyIdehen/about LinkedIn Profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/kidehen Personal WebID: http://kingsley.idehen.net/dataspace/person/kidehen#this
smime.p7s
Description: S/MIME Cryptographic Signature
