[open-bibliography] British Library data announcement

Mon Nov 22 11:26:46 UTC 2010

All,

One comment from DCMI on the range of dcterms:identifier.

The range of that property is rdfs:Literal, on purpose.

The reason is that an identifier is by definition a string of characters; it is not the resource it identifies. Of course, if the identifier is a URI, you can resolve that URI to get to the resource it identifies but it is not what the identifier "is".

<somenamespace:identifier rdf:resource="urn:isbn:0123456789" /> would say that the identifier IS the resource identified by the ISBN which is not what you want.

Makx Dekkers.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: open-bibliography-bounces at lists.okfn.org [mailto:open-
> bibliography-bounces at lists.okfn.org] On Behalf Of Deliot, Corine
> Sent: Monday, November 22, 2010 11:30 AM
> To: William Waites; List for Working Group on Open Bibliographic Data
> Subject: Re: [open-bibliography] British Library data announcement
> 
> William, many thanks for your feedback.
> 
> Re: isbns.
> They appear in dcterms:identifier
> [http://purl.org/dc/terms/identifier] and the range of that property
> is rdfs:literal [1], which is why we have recorded them as a string
> literal.
> 
> The latest version of the data available from us (version 0.3.1) also
> includes isbns and issns in bibo:isbn and bibo:issn. These are sub-
> properties of bibo:identifier, which has the range of rdfs:literal
> [2], which is why we again have recorded these as string literals.
> 
> My understanding is that if we wanted to treat isbns and issns as
> resources, then we would have to use dc:identifier
> http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/identifier, which had no range defined
> or another property from another RDF vocabulary with the appropriate
> range.
> 
> I will lowercase the urn:isbn, urn:issn in our next release, thanks.
> 
> [1] http://dublincore.org/documents/dcmi-terms/#terms-identifier
> [2] http://bibotools.googlecode.com/svn/bibo-
> ontology/trunk/doc/index.html
> 
> We are aware that blank nodes are an issue but we are not in a
> position to mint our own URIs yet. We are investigating how best to do
> this.
> 
> Thanks again
> 
> Best, Corine
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: open-bibliography-bounces at lists.okfn.org [mailto:open-
> bibliography-bounces at lists.okfn.org] On Behalf Of William Waites
> Sent: 2010-11-20 10:49
> To: List for Working Group on Open Bibliographic Data
> Subject: Re: [open-bibliography] British Library data announcement
> 
> one that stands out, while not an error in rdf syntax is the treatment
> of isbns. they appear as dc:identifier, which is fine, though
> bibo:isbn might be better, but they are expressed as
> URN:ISBN:0123456789 - as a string literal rather than a
> resource. additionally it is uncommon th uppercase the prefix there,
> and case does matter.
> 
> also, none of the records have uris. they are all identified with
> blank nodes. so one of the first things we did was to mint uris for
> them - htttp://bnb.bibliographica.org/entry/... (sorry, on the train
> right now, typing into my mobile so i can't get a real example, but if
> you run the default sparql query you should find something). in an
> ideal world each record in the british national bibliography will have
> an identifier like http://bnb.bl.uk/GB123ABC that will dereference,
> etc. - note for this dataset we've used the bnb id - which itself
> wants a special predicate rather than just dc:identifier, or maybe a
> datatype for use with skos:notation - as the primary identifier, since
> that seemed appropriate...
> 
> last note, http://bnb.bibliographica.org/ is not yet for general
> consumption, still need to hook together some bits of the user
> interface for searching etc. over the next couple of days, so if you
> do poke around, please consider it a preview for an interested
> community rather than a finished product.
> 
> cheers,
> -w
> 
> * [2010-11-18 15:24:24 -0000] Deliot, Corine <Corine.Deliot at bl.uk>
> écrit:
> 
> ] Ben,
> ]
> ] Your blog entry makes interesting reading.
> ]
> ] With reference to the occurrences of rdf:description instead of
> ] rdf:Description, these have now been corrected and an updated
> version
> ] (0.3.1) of the data is now available directly from the British
> Library.
> ]
> ] Your post mentions RDF errors. Beyond the one noted above, is there
> ] anything else? Obviously, we rely on user feedback to improve our
> ] output; so, if there is anything else, please let us know.
> ]
> ] Regards
> ]
> ] Corine
> ]
> ] *********************************
> ] Corine Deliot
> ] Metadata Standards Analyst
> ] The British Library
> ] Boston Spa, Wetherby
> ] West Yorkshire LS23 7BQ
> ] e-mail: corine.deliot at bl.uk
> ] *********************************
> ]
> ]
> ] -----Original Message-----
> ] From: open-bibliography-bounces at lists.okfn.org
> ] [mailto:open-bibliography-bounces at lists.okfn.org] On Behalf Of Ben
> ] O'Steen
> ] Sent: 2010-11-18 09:25
> ] To: List for Working Group on Open Bibliographic Data
> ] Subject: Re: [open-bibliography] British Library data announcement
> ]
> ] On Thu, 2010-11-18 at 09:12 +0000, Christopher Gutteridge wrote:
> ] > http://vocab.org/bio/0.1/.html#Death (although has a level of
> ] > indirection you may find annoying. You can't just say X died Y,
> you
> ] have
> ] > to say X Death D
> ] > D date Y
> ]
> ] Yep - I've even drawn some pics about that :)
> ]
> ] http://openbiblio.net/2010/11/17/augmenting-the-british-librarys-
> rdf-dat
> ] a-to-allow-for-disambiguation/
> ]
> ] Ben
> ]
> ]
> ] >
> ] > Peter Murray-Rust wrote:
> ] > > Thanks Will,
> ] > >
> ] > > One great idea for a use-case has surfaced today (anonymous, but
> ] I'll
> ] > > give credit if I get permission) - to add the author's death-
> date to
> ]
> ] > > bibliography. This has immediate and widespread practicality in
> the
> ] > > OKF with the release of the copyright calculator. It should be
> ] > > possible to mashup chunks of the bibliography with DBPedia and I
> ] would
> ] > > expect this could resolve many authors (with, of course the
> problem
> ] of
> ] > > disambiguation). However known lists of authors with death dates
> ] might
> ] > > also help with the disambiguation.
> ] > >
> ] > > But maybe you have all thought of this already.
> ] > >
> ] > > --
> ] > > Peter Murray-Rust
> ] > > Reader in Molecular Informatics
> ] > > Unilever Centre, Dep. Of Chemistry
> ] > > University of Cambridge
> ] > > CB2 1EW, UK
> ] > > +44-1223-763069
> ] > >
> ] --------------------------------------------------------------------
> ----
> ] > >
> ] > > _______________________________________________
> ] > > open-bibliography mailing list
> ] > > open-bibliography at lists.okfn.org
> ] > > http://lists.okfn.org/mailman/listinfo/open-bibliography
> ] > >
> ] >
> ]
> ]
> ]
> ] _______________________________________________
> ] open-bibliography mailing list
> ] open-bibliography at lists.okfn.org
> ] http://lists.okfn.org/mailman/listinfo/open-bibliography
> ]
> ]
> **********************************************************************
> ****
> ] Experience the British Library online at http://www.bl.uk/
> ]
> ] The British Library???s new interactive Annual Report and Accounts
> 2009/10 : http://www.bl.uk/knowledge
> ]
> ] Help the British Library conserve the world's knowledge. Adopt a
> Book. http://www.bl.uk/adoptabook
> ]
> ] The Library's St Pancras site is WiFi - enabled
> ]
> ]
> **********************************************************************
> ***
> ]
> ] The information contained in this e-mail is confidential and may be
> legally privileged. It is intended for the addressee(s) only. If you
> are not the intended recipient, please delete this e-mail and notify
> the mailto:postmaster at bl.uk : The contents of this e-mail must not be
> disclosed or copied without the sender's consent.
> ]
> ] The statements and opinions expressed in this message are those of
> the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the British
> Library. The British Library does not take any responsibility for the
> views of the author.
> ]
> ]
> **********************************************************************
> ***
> ]  Think before you print
> ]
> ] _______________________________________________
> ] open-bibliography mailing list
> ] open-bibliography at lists.okfn.org
> ] http://lists.okfn.org/mailman/listinfo/open-bibliography
> 
> --
> William Waites
> http://eris.okfn.org/ww/foaf#i
> 9C7E F636 52F6 1004 E40A  E565 98E3 BBF3 8320 7664
> 
> _______________________________________________
> open-bibliography mailing list
> open-bibliography at lists.okfn.org
> http://lists.okfn.org/mailman/listinfo/open-bibliography
> 
> **********************************************************************
> ****
> Experience the British Library online at http://www.bl.uk/
> 
> The British Library’s new interactive Annual Report and Accounts
> 2009/10 : http://www.bl.uk/knowledge
> 
> Help the British Library conserve the world's knowledge. Adopt a Book.
> http://www.bl.uk/adoptabook
> 
> The Library's St Pancras site is WiFi - enabled
> 
> **********************************************************************
> ***
> 
> The information contained in this e-mail is confidential and may be
> legally privileged. It is intended for the addressee(s) only. If you
> are not the intended recipient, please delete this e-mail and notify
> the mailto:postmaster at bl.uk : The contents of this e-mail must not be
> disclosed or copied without the sender's consent.
> 
> The statements and opinions expressed in this message are those of the
> author and do not necessarily reflect those of the British Library.
> The British Library does not take any responsibility for the views of
> the author.
> 
> **********************************************************************
> ***
>  Think before you print
> 
> _______________________________________________
> open-bibliography mailing list
> open-bibliography at lists.okfn.org
> http://lists.okfn.org/mailman/listinfo/open-bibliography