[topicmapmail] Temporality in Topic Maps

[Alexander Johannesen]

Hi all,

I've been struggeling lately with the concept of temporality in KM
systems and was wondering what people here normally do when they face
these issues, such as relationships, topics and reifications over
time. Would you do one association with a role for time, or
occurrences of the various topics, etc?

topic 1990-1993
topic 1993-1995
topic 1995-1999
topic 1999-2006

assoc X
   type membership
   member "some person" role:human
   member "some organisation" role:organisation
   member 1990-1993 role:time-period
   member 1999-2006 role:time-period

This ends up hopelessly complex when you've got huge numbers. The other way ;

topic "some person"
   occurrence "membership-at-some-organisation" value="1990-1993"
   occurrence "membership-at-some-organisation" value="1999-2006"

Again, quite messy. Let's move on to ;

topic "some person"
topic "some organisation"
topic "some period"
assoc X
   type membership-period
   member "some person" role:person
   member "some organisation" role:organisation
   member "some time period" role:time-period

I assume most would lean towards this latter, but this also presents
problems with scalability and when "some organisation" changes over
time, especially where there's overlap in "some period".

How does people handle these things?


Alex
-- 
"Ultimately, all things are known because you want to believe you know."
                                                         - Frank Herbert
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