[rdfweb-dev] Names In FOAF

[Ian Davis]

I've been thinking about names in FOAF. There's an issue[1] in the 
tracker to rationalise the properties here and Morten has made a 
concrete proposal[2]. It's a tricky area to model because of the variety 
and complexity of names in various cultures.

I've made an alternate suggestion[3], which is to forego any kind of 
structural modelling and tackle it from a mode of address angle. I 
propose to drop everything but foaf:name (which is well established) and 
  add four new properties:

familiarName - the name used in familiar situations by friends, e.g. Ian

informalName - the name used when referred to in informal situations, 
e.g. Ian Davis

formalName - the name used when referred to in formal situations, e.g. 
Mr. Davis

fullName - the full name as expected to be used on an identifying 
document e.g. Mr Ian Robert Davis


I think this approach would fit better with the social nature of FOAF.

Ian

[1] http://rdfweb.org/topic/NameVocabIssue
[2] http://rdfweb.org/topic/NamesInFoaf
[3] http://rdfweb.org/topic/NamesInFoafAlternate

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