[FEATURE] Gloss definition property

[pbuttigieg]

Hi all - is there a convention on what annotation property/axiom we should use for gloss definitions?

Would something as general as dc:description work? It sseems very broad: http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/description http://purl.org/dc/terms/description

Is there something better than that?

[cmungall]

I think we should first start with the definition of gloss, and the function it serves. I have used this term for a long time to mean the part of a definition that appears after the period, with the gloss containing additional discursive text to help elucidate the term

From: https://douroucouli.wordpress.com/2019/07/08/ontotip-write-simple-concise-clear-operational-textual-definitions/

If you need to include discursive text, use either the definition gloss or a separate description field. The ‘gloss’ is the part of the text definition that comes after the first period/full-stop. A common practice in the GO is to recapitulate the definition of the differentia in the gloss. For example, the definition for ‘ectoderm development’ is

“The process whose specific outcome is the progression of the ectoderm over time, from its formation to the mature structure. In animal embryos, the ectoderm is the outer germ layer of the embryo, formed during gastrulation.”.

I think I inherited the term gloss from @phismith. I may be using it in a more restricted sense than is common; specifically for a gloss that is embedded in the text of an existing definition, noting definitions of any referenced terms. I think I should start saying "definition gloss" more specifically when I am referring to a textual part of a definition.

In the piece above I talk about some of the issues with gloss, namely DRY. In some ontologies I have used skos:note to embed definitions, avoiding the need for definition gloss e.g.

name: blue car definition: A car that is blue EquivalentTo: car and has-characteristic some blue skos:note: A car is a vehicle with four wheels skos:note: blue is a color intermediate between green and violet

Here the skos:note is automatically generated from the signature of the logical definition

The disadvantage of definition embedding is that it violates DRY. The main advantage is that the definition is shown prominently in most displays and time-bound users are far more likely to to read this (anecdotal, I have no data on this)

[wdduncan]

FWIW, I think it is helpful that glosses get separated out. It makes them queryable, and you can have more than one gloss.

This is in contrast to definitions in which the genus/differentia form can lead to stilted language. Here is an example of the definition from the oral health and disease ontology for human dental patient that is a "definition" in the genus/differentia sense, but would benefit from a description/explanation/gloss (or whatever you want to call it):

A Homo sapiens that bears some dental patient role.

In order to fulling understand to definition you have to look up the definition for dental patient role:

A patient role that is realized by the process of being under the care of a dental health care provider.

Now, in order to understand this, you need to be familiar with how roles and realizations work in BFO.

Also, the practice of tacking on a gloss a the end of a definition may lead to confusion.

I'm not exactly sure where the term "gloss" as it pertains to ontology came from. I inherited the use of the term from Alex Diehl, but I surmise he inherited it from Barry Smith or maybe Chris. In any case, I don't think the lineage is of much concern.

See here for a dictionary definition of the noun 'gloss'.

[pbuttigieg]

I'd rather separate this out and not have it as an extension of the definition for many reasons, but primarily so we can easily filter in different interfaces.

[graybeal]

+1 for skos:note (if it is precise enough; there are some skos:note uses that are not very definitional), and thank you for the definition of gloss definition. Minor note: using a period as the key element in characterizing the gloss definition, rather than a functional definition (e.g., "The part of the definition that is not essential to precise understanding, but provides useful additional context") will also create a strange "fit everything in before you end the sentence" writing style for necessarily complex definitions, won't it?

Anyway, I love the idea that skos:note can be used for everything peripheral, and definition for everything core.