Dear David, That's a very interesting idea; I hadn't thought about collections this way before.
> Imagine three web resources that have nothing in common: > > 1. A chapter from Leo Tolstoy's "War and Peace": > http://www.literaturepage.com/read/warandpeace-114.html > 2. A picture of Puget Sound, inspired by a zoom meeting background: > > https://www.mountaineers.org/blog/we-are-puget-sound/@@images/762cf30d-b6e1-4844-926a-b16d3c9e3dfc.jpeg > 3. A video describing next generation nuclear reactor design: > https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0BybPPIMuQQ&t=5752s > > Imagine that SPDX authors create an Artifact Element for each of the > resources. Each Artifact Element has a different creator and creation time. > > ....... > > The same three (unrelated) Artifact Elements can be included in a > ContextualCollection. In this case the context is the fact that the > collection was created as an atomic unit by a specific creator. A > ContextualCollection can be a mixture of Elements created as part of the > Collection Element, and ExternalElements created prior to the Collection. Please note that in this email I use artefact broadly to mean anything that isn't SPDX data, not files and packages specifically. The creatorship information as context is a particularly interesting concept, because up until this point I think we have been discussing the shared context of artefacts that SPDX data represent, rather than the context of the SPDX data itself. Clearly, context of the artefacts is important and not transient, because it may tell the consumer of the data about how the artefacts are related. Therefore, the two questions I would ask are: 1. Is there any use-case where creatorship information or other context of the SPDX data itself must be retained? If not, we can have a transient collection type as you describe. 2. Are all possible contexts of artefacts possible to describe with File or Package elements? If not, then we do rather need a non-transient collection type for artefact context. I think that, for No. 2, the answer would be 'no', as you might want to group together SPDX data about multiple programs which have a common author (but aren't in the same file or package) in a collection. > The second slide illustrates how three unrelated Artifact Elements > become related by being included in a Collection Element that > identifies a single work of art. (Interpreting that work is an > exercise for the reader.) I wish you the best of luck with your blockchain-based art enterprise! Best wishes, Sebastian -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Links: You receive all messages sent to this group. View/Reply Online (#4248): https://lists.spdx.org/g/Spdx-tech/message/4248 Mute This Topic: https://lists.spdx.org/mt/86611379/21656 Group Owner: [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://lists.spdx.org/g/Spdx-tech/unsub [[email protected]] -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
