[QUAR] Re: Expressing position in RDF

[Norman Gray]

On 2008 Oct 14, at 23:39, Matthew Graham wrote:

>>> I think the answer to my original question is that there is  
>>> nothing currently existing in the VO to allow me to do this  
>>> succinctly.
>>
>> In that case this represents an opportunity for making an original  
>> contribution to the VO and to broader astronomical practice.
>
> Great - yet another opportunity to make an original contribution to  
> the VO!

At the risk of throwing a grenade into this enjoyable discussion, can  
I ask an original and forward-thinking question?

How would you do this in FITS-WCS?

A FITS header is a set of predicate-object pairs with, in most cases  
the same subject.  Put the right kind of pointy brackets around that  
and you've got your triples.  Your RDF problem is solved, with  
semantics as precisely defined (in the three Papers) as you'd want.

With the RDF problem solved, it's just a matter of rearrangement to  
solve the RDFa problem.

FITS-WCS may have its warts (I'm not qualified to have much of an  
opinion here), but that doesn't matter: getting the data out there, in  
a form that has broad software support, and which degrades smoothly so  
that you can say simple things simply, is more important than  
completeness (I think Bernard made a similar point).

Dare I go further (heresy!): it's OK to have more than one way to say  
things!

All the best,

Norman


-- 
Norman Gray  :  http://nxg.me.uk
Dept Physics and Astronomy, University of Leicester