[foaf-dev] FOAF functional datatype properties

Aidan Hogan <[email protected]> Thu, 17 Nov 2011 16:38:47 +0000

Newsgroups	gmane.comp.web.rdfweb
Message-ID	<[email protected]>

Hi folks,

Just a not-so-quick email about FOAF functional datatype properties, namely

	foaf:age, foaf:birthday, foaf:gender

I'm wondering if it might make sense for the FOAF documentation to be a 
little more explicit/strict on what forms the values of these properties 
should take?

If a person has two slightly different values for the same such property 
(e.g., "Male", "male", "male"@en for gender; or "12-04", "12-4", 
"--12-04"^^xsd:gMonthDay for birthday; or so forth) this causes an 
inconsistency. Actually, this is great: we've been using this for 
figuring out when smushing goes wrong (e.g., smushing male and female 
users of opera).

However, I think the FOAF documentation should make it a little clearer 
what values it expects for these properties to avoid inadventent 
clashes. There is some guidance for gender and for birthday in the docs, 
so maybe it's sufficient to highlight the importance of keeping to 
recommended values, and maybe to discourage use of language tags for 
gender, make datatype (or lack thereof) recommendations explicit, etc.

Find attached stats extracted from use of these properties from the BTC 
11 corpus; a summary:
* foaf:age is very rarely used.
* foaf:gender is mainly used by opera and hi5, and keeps largely to 
"male"|"female" values; few language tags at the moment
* foaf:birthday is mainly used by hi5, but breaks the spec 
recommendation for "MM-DD" values, having instead e.g., "1-1", "3-12".

In summary, it's not a big problem at the moment, but it might be a good 
time to clarify issues around these properties earlier rather than 
later, and to emphasise the importance of consistency in values.

Cheers,
Aidan

P.S.,
Aside from legacy data, my preferences would be:
* a nonNegativeInteger value for age (or deprecate the property since it 
tends to go stale)
* a gYearMonth for birthday, and
* "male"|"female"|<other lowercase value> for gender. [no language tags]

...but it might be too late for that.

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foaf-gender-birthday-age.txt (text/plain, 5.8 KB)

=====preds 3=====
http://xmlns.com/foaf/0.1/gender	1082195
http://xmlns.com/foaf/0.1/birthday	730825
http://xmlns.com/foaf/0.1/age	8
=====age values 7=====
21	2
26	1
45	1
8	1
From curl 2	1
abracadabra	1
indeterminate	1
=====gender values 11=====
male	586019
female	496103
	45
Male	8
male	8
male	4
female	3
m	2
Female	1
female	1
male	1
=====birthday values 378=====
1-1	39299
2-14	3304
12-31	2981
10-10	2446
2-2	2432
3-1	2432
1-10	2428
4-1	2393
9-1	2365
5-1	2347
8-1	2324
5-5	2311
10-1	2297
5-10	2286
6-6	2273
6-1	2268
3-3	2258
7-7	2255
2-1	2254
1-20	2246
8-10	2234
3-10	2216
9-10	2216
9-15	2192
8-8	2187
1-15	2178
4-10	2169
4-20	2154
8-20	2152
7-1	2151
4-4	2150
9-23	2136
8-15	2134
2-28	2128
9-9	2125
6-20	2117
11-11	2113
1-5	2106
6-10	2101
7-20	2101
11-1	2088
2-10	2085
9-19	2084
7-10	2082
12-1	2078
9-27	2069
9-20	2064
1-2	2060
12-25	2052
9-22	2052
5-15	2051
12-12	2045
4-15	2039
5-20	2038
2-20	2029
10-20	2024
9-14	2023
7-17	2022
9-25	2009
9-17	2008
9-28	1998
1-6	1996
7-15	1995
9-24	1993
3-15	1990
9-16	1990
9-26	1989
6-15	1984
2-18	1982
1-25	1981
7-23	1981
8-18	1976
12-20	1972
1-27	1970
1-12	1969
7-22	1967
1-30	1963
5-25	1962
8-16	1960
9-18	1960
8-12	1956
7-27	1955
3-20	1953
10-15	1951
1-4	1948
11-23	1947
4-25	1944
8-28	1944
7-28	1943
4-14	1942
3-25	1941
2-15	1940
1-18	1939
3-21	1939
1-22	1937
1-17	1933
12-10	1932
8-23	1932
9-21	1932
9-8	1932
5-17	1931
5-12	1930
5-18	1928
6-17	1927
1-14	1926
11-10	1924
8-22	1923
9-30	1923
10-12	1920
6-24	1919
4-28	1918
5-13	1917
1-3	1916
6-14	1915
8-30	1915
9-13	1915
1-23	1914
1-19	1913
10-25	1913
7-25	1913
4-23	1912
11-20	1910
3-24	1909
7-14	1909
5-24	1908
7-24	1907
1-21	1903
1-26	1903
5-19	1902
7-16	1901
8-14	1901
8-25	1901
8-7	1901
3-27	1899
10-16	1896
1-7	1895
8-17	1895
8-27	1895
10-8	1894
5-16	1893
8-5	1893
4-16	1892
9-29	1892
4-26	1887
5-14	1887
9-7	1887
3-14	1886
4-19	1886
5-6	1886
3-28	1885
9-12	1884
11-15	1883
4-7	1883
4-17	1882
7-12	1882
7-5	1882
6-16	1881
7-18	1880
7-4	1880
9-11	1879
3-5	1878
9-5	1877
9-6	1877
2-24	1876
2-3	1876
3-16	1876
4-18	1876
7-26	1876
1-28	1875
5-22	1875
2-27	1874
3-26	1874
5-26	1874
1-29	1869
10-6	1869
8-4	1869
2-6	1868
3-19	1867
8-6	1866
12-17	1865
6-12	1865
3-11	1864
5-27	1864
6-5	1862
1-16	1861
1-24	1859
11-18	1859
6-23	1859
2-22	1858
8-19	1858
10-18	1856
3-13	1856
3-8	1856
10-5	1855
3-23	1854
4-12	1854
6-18	1854
4-30	1853
6-7	1853
8-13	1853
3-22	1852
7-11	1852
4-5	1851
5-7	1846
10-30	1845
11-22	1845
3-18	1845
4-27	1845
10-24	1844
10-28	1844
11-25	1843
3-17	1843
5-21	1841
10-4	1840
2-21	1840
4-9	1840
6-13	1840
12-24	1839
1-13	1838
4-6	1838
1-11	1836
10-31	1836
12-14	1836
4-24	1835
5-28	1835
2-19	1834
4-13	1834
12-21	1831
10-2	1830
8-21	1830
2-5	1829
4-22	1829
5-3	1827
7-29	1827
1-31	1826
10-14	1825
11-16	1825
2-25	1825
10-26	1824
12-5	1824
8-3	1823
10-9	1821
4-11	1820
5-9	1820
12-18	1819
4-3	1819
8-26	1819
1-9	1816
3-2	1816
5-11	1816
6-21	1816
5-2	1815
11-4	1814
6-11	1814
8-11	1814
6-29	1813
10-29	1811
11-28	1811
5-8	1811
6-26	1811
8-24	1811
11-13	1810
11-5	1810
8-9	1810
4-8	1809
11-8	1808
7-2	1808
3-12	1807
3-9	1806
3-4	1805
5-4	1805
6-22	1805
6-25	1805
2-26	1804
9-2	1804
1-8	1803
10-22	1802
2-12	1801
2-23	1801
10-3	1800
7-13	1800
7-19	1800
2-17	1798
7-8	1796
5-23	1795
10-17	1793
2-11	1791
10-23	1790
6-9	1788
12-28	1787
12-15	1786
8-29	1785
6-30	1784
11-17	1782
6-28	1781
2-16	1779
11-27	1778
9-3	1777
9-4	1777
7-9	1774
11-2	1773
3-29	1773
5-29	1772
6-8	1772
7-21	1770
12-16	1769
8-2	1769
6-27	1766
7-6	1766
3-7	1765
11-24	1763
10-7	1760
11-19	1759
12-3	1758
3-6	1758
4-21	1758
6-19	1757
12-8	1756
6-4	1756
11-6	1755
2-7	1751
7-31	1749
5-30	1746
3-30	1745
10-21	1743
11-26	1740
4-2	1740
11-12	1739
6-3	1739
11-9	1738
11-21	1737
12-27	1737
12-13	1735
7-3	1735
12-29	1734
2-9	1733
2-4	1731
10-13	1730
11-30	1729
7-30	1726
6-2	1725
12-26	1723
12-6	1722
10-11	1719
12-19	1718
12-2	1718
12-22	1717
11-14	1716
4-29	1715
10-19	1712
11-29	1711
11-7	1708
10-27	1707
11-3	1703
12-7	1699
12-4	1693
12-23	1692
2-8	1677
2-13	1674
3-31	1658
5-31	1656
12-11	1654
12-9	1645
12-30	1640
8-31	1629
2-29	383
03-24	2
09-09	2
09-18	2
10-01	2
03-31	1
05-02	1
05-30	1
07-26	1
07-29	1
09-29	1
1981-10-07	1
1981-11-25	1
=====age datatypes 1=====
none	8
=====gender datatypes t3=====
none	1082183
http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#Literal	11
http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string	1
=====birthday datatypes 2=====
none	730824
http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#gMonthDay	1
=====age language tags 1=====
none	8
=====gender language tags 2=====
none	1082190
en	5
=====birthday language tags 2=====
none	730824
en	1
=====age domain 3=====
mit.edu	5
ianmcorvidae.net	2
hu-berlin.de	1
=====gender domains 42=====
hi5.com	974322
opera.com	105227
johngoodwin.me.uk	2559
kasei.us	21
gnoss.com	11
myopenlink.net	10
vu.nl	5
hu-berlin.de	2
mindswap.org	2
nickshanks.com	2
openlinksw.com	2
openrdf.org	2
aelius.com	1
anjeve.de	1
b4mad.net	1
barkingiguana.com	1
bblfish.net	1
darcus.name	1
eyaloren.org	1
f00die.com	1
fcns.eu	1
fgiasson.com	1
gnowledge.org	1
ibiblio.org	1
idehen.name	1
inria.fr	1
kanzaki.com	1
kuruman.org	1
ldodds.com	1
mmt.me.uk	1
pipian.com	1
proofile.org	1
reallywow.com	1
semantic-web.at	1
simon-reinhardt.de	1
soton.ac.uk	1
staticfree.info	1
tramp.name	1
uni-leipzig.de	1
wchulseiee.net	1
webr3.org	1
wikier.org	1
=====birthday domains 15=====
hi5.com	730808
deri.ie	2
ianmcorvidae.net	2
myopenlink.net	2
bblfish.net	1
fcns.eu	1
fgiasson.com	1
jenitennison.com	1
mit.edu	1
pipian.com	1
proofile.org	1
tramp.name	1
wchulseiee.net	1
webr3.org	1
wikier.org	1