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8.4. URI of an Expression
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Naming Conventions
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Characterizing the Expression is the specific identification of a content with respect to another content. This includes specifications of the version and the language of the expression. Therefore, different versions of the same work, or the same version of the same work expressed in different languages correspond to different Expressions and will have different URIs.
Expressions are organized in components (the ExpressionComponents), and therefore we need to identify separately the Expression as a whole as well as the individual URIs for each ExpressionComponent. All of them are all immediately derived from the baseline, which is the URI for the WORK.
URI for the expression as a whole
The URI for the EXPRESSION as a whole consists of the following pieces:
- The URI of the corresponding WORK
- The character “/”
- The human language code in which the expression is drafted (a three-letter code according to ISO 639-2 alpha-3)
- An optional version identifier, composed of the “@” character followed by:
- If an approved act, the version date of the expression in syntax YYYY-MM-DD.
- If a bill, the presentation date is appropriate, or the stage in the approval process that the current draft is the result of.
The absence of the version identifiers signals two different situations depending on the type of document:
- If the document is not versioned (e.g., the debate record of an assembly) then no version identifier need not and cannot be present.
- If the document is versioned (e.g., an act in force), then the lack of version identifiers refers to the version in force at the moment of the resolution of the URI (i.e., the “current” version of the act, where “current” refers to the moment in time in which the URI is dereferenced, rather than the moment in time in which the document containing the URI was created).
A particular expression is the first version of a Work. This expression should not be confused with the Work itself (which considers the first Expression in no special way to all other possible Expressions), and it is a very specific, although peculiar, Expression.
The original version of an expression is referred to with an URI with a dangling "@" character (which implies that the actual version date is the first appropriate date for that work
- http://www.authority.org/dz/debaterecord/2004-12-21/fra
Algerian parliamentary debate record, 21st December 2004., French version
- http://www.authority.org/sl/act/2004-02-13/2/eng
Sierra Leone enacted Legislation. Act number 2 of 2004. English version, current version (as accessed today. - http://www.authority.org/sl/act/2004-02-13/2/eng@
Sierra Leone enacted Legislation. Act number 2 of 2004. English version, original version - http://www.authority.org/sl/act/2004-02-13/2/eng@2004-07-21
Sierra Leone enacted Legislation. Act number 2 of 2004. English version, as amended on July 2004 - http://www.authority.org/ng/bill/2003-05-14/19/eng@first
Namibia Bill number 19 of 2003, first stage, English version - http://www.authority.org/mg/act/2003-03-12/3/mul
Madagascar. Act 3 from 2003 in French and Malagasy.
URIs for Expression Components
Some expressions have many components, some are only composed of a main document. In order to explicitly refer to individual components, it is therefore necessary to introduce a naming convention that identifies individual components, and still allows an easy connection between the component and the expression it belongs to.
There are therefore two subcases:
The expression is only composed of one component
In this case, the URI for the expression as a whole and for its main component are identical plus the name “main”.
The expression is composed of many components
The URI for each ExpressionComponent consist in this case of the following pieces:
- The URI of the corresponding EXPRESSION as a whole
- The character “/”
- Either
- A unique name for the attachment
- The name “main” which is reserved for the main document. It we have different main they are numbered sequentially: main1, main2, etc.
- http://www.authority.org/al/minutes/2004-12-21/fra/main
Algerian parliamentary debate record, 21st December 2004., French version, main document
- http://www.authority.org/sl/act/2004-02-13/2/eng/main
Main body of the Sierra Leone enacted Legislation. Act number 2 of 2004. English version, current version (as accessed today) - http://www.authority.org/sl/act/2004-02-13/2/eng@2004-07-21/schedule1
Attachment “schedule01” of Sierra Leone enacted Legislation. Act number 2 of 2004. English version, as amended on July 2004 - http://www.authority.org/na/bill/2003-05-14/19/eng@first/schedule3
Third attachment of Namibia Bill number 19 of 2003, first stage, English version
Hierarchies of components in Expression Components
A frequent situation occurs when an attachment has itself further attachments. This creates a complex hierarchical situation in which the component should be considered, in a way, an expression itself, whose components should be listed as well and properly differentiated. The process can be further iterated, in the situation in which not only an attachment to an expression has further attachments, but its attachments also have further attachments and so on. The situation must also foresee the situation in which attachments at different levels of the hierarchy end up having the same name (e.g., table A in schedule 1 and table A in schedule 2).
In such situations, each ExpressionComponent must be considered as an expression by itself. Recursively, the URI of attachments are as follows:
- if the attachment does not have further attachments, its URI is provided as detailed in the previous section, without further addenda.
- If the attachment has further attachments, the URI as detailed in the previous section refers to the whole attachment, including its own attachments.
- To refer to the main document of an attachment that has further attachments, a further “/main” part should be added.
- To refer to any further attachment of an attachment, a further “/” followed by a unique name for the attachment must be added to the attachment itself.
- http://www.authority.org/sl/act/2004-02-13/2/eng@2004-07-21/main/schedule1
Whole attachment “schedule01” of the Sierra Leone enacted Legislation. Act number 2 of 2004. English version, English version, as amended on July 2004. - http://www.authority.org/sl/act/2004-02-13/2/eng@2004-07-21/main/schedule1/main
Main document of the attachment “schedule01” of Sierra Leone enacted Legislation. Act number 2 of 2004. English version, as amended on July 2004 - http://www.authority.org/sl/act/2004-02-13/2/eng@2004-07-21/main/schedule1/tableA
Attachment “Table A” of the attachment “schedule01” of Sierra Leone enacted Legislation. Act number 2 of 2004. English version, as amended on July 2004 - http://www.authority.org/sl/act/2004-02-13/2/eng@2004-07-21/main/schedule1/attachment1/
main
Main document of the attachment “attachment01” of the attachment “schedule01” of Sierra Leone enacted Legislation. Act number 2 of 2004. English version, amended on July 2004
URIs for virtual expressions
In some situations the actual enter-in-force date of the expression is not known in advance, and it is necessary to create references or mentions of documents whose URI is now known completely (possibly, because their exact delivery date is not known yet). These are called virtual expressions (i.e., references to expressions that probably do not exist yet or ever, but can be unambiguously deduced once all relevant information are made available).
We must distinguish three cases in such situation:
- the information is not known by the author of the expression (e.g., the legislator), in which case the act of actually retrieving the correct information is an act of interpretation;
- the information is not known by the editor of the expression (e.g., the publisher of the XML version of the document), in which case the information can theoretically be available, but is too much of a burden for the publisher to retrieve it.
- the information is not know by the query system.
In all these cases, the syntax for the URI of the virtual expression uses a similar syntax to the specification of the actual expression, but the character “:” is used instead of the “@” after the specification of the work URI.
For instance, if we need to reference the expression of an act in force on date “1/1/2007”, we will probably need to refer to some expression whose enter in force date was in a previous date to 1/1/2007.
http://www.authority.org/sl/act/2004-02-13/2/eng:2004-07-21
Sierra Leone enacted Legislation. Act number 2 of 2004. English version, as amended on the closest date before July 21, 2004