Freebase: Discussion about gmackenz

please delete this topic

2010-01-05T16:00:52.0017Z

I added it before I realized that there is already the Johann Gottfried Bernhard Bach topic.

Island: Max properties unique

2010-01-05T07:27:38.0018Z

Is there a reason why max length and max width properties of /geography/island are not unique? I think they should be made unique.

Building complex: Include Project Focus

2010-01-05T07:17:03.0000Z

I think Project Focus should be an included type of Building complex.

milagrosbara: Broa & Manuel Quiroga Losada

2010-01-05T00:40:32.0000Z

Hi milagrosbara, welcome to Freebase!

I noticed you added record labels to Manuel Quiroga Losada's topic. Excellent. Unfortunately, however, you selected a type of bread as one of his record labels (broa). Bread cannot also be a record label :) If there was or is a record label named Broa, please create a new topic for it. If you need help doing that, just ask!

Thanks, and again welcome to the community

Australian Suburb: SSC

2010-01-04T22:22:08.0016Z

I'll create a task to set up the property and namespace for state suburb codes, so that we can enter these as foreign keys.

Airline: Airline designator properties/types

2010-01-04T21:56:13.0000Z

This is a relic, basically -- these predate any standardized notion of keys, and we tried out a lot of different ways of handling them. These should probably just be gardened into enumerated keys or machine-readable strings; types are definitely not the best way to handle this. A brief look suggests that the IATA two-digit designator is non-unique, so might be better off as a string. But the ICAO is apparently unique, so that would be a good candidate for a key. We already have an ICAO namespace, so we just need to create the appropriate sub-namespace (/authority/icao/airline_designator?) and then refactor the data a bit.

Does this sound like a reasonable plan?

Organism Classification Rank: Higher/lower rank

2010-01-04T20:51:53.0000Z

Yeah, it's sort of odd -- looking at the data, I was expecting that the values should be all the ranks which can possibly be the next higher or lower rank, but it seems like most of the data is just for the sub/super/infra/etc. ranks, which I don't think really fits that description.

Column: Unsyndicated columns?

2010-01-04T18:42:07.0006Z

Great! Now all we need is to figure out how to model both syndicated and unsyndicated columns (harking back to the first two posts in this thread), and we can get this schema promoted.

Seatrain Shipbuilding: Seatrain Shipbuilding

2010-01-04T15:53:21.0013Z

If anyone is looking for detailed information on the Brooklyn Navy Yard & Seatrain Shipbuilding, the Brooklyn Historical Society has an great collection of photo's and print information. Please try www.brooklynhistory.org/library/wp/trezza-frank

Organism Classification Rank: Higher/lower rank

2010-01-04T12:44:08.0013Z

That's exactly what I'm trying to use it for, but in that case it's missing some really obvious data: for example, genus doesn't have a higher rank of family, so I startted wondering if there was something I was missing :-)

Organism Classification Rank: Higher/lower rank

2010-01-04T12:37:35.0006Z

Sanity checking on the higher/lower classifications in Organism Classification?? (I'm guessing.)

Organism Classification Rank: Higher/lower rank

2010-01-04T12:20:02.0019Z

What are the higher/lower rank properties on the Organism Classification Rank type intended for?

tfmorris: US House of Representatives

2010-01-04T11:49:38.0013Z

Unless I'm misreading the history for the six that you cleaned up the other day (A. Walter Norblad, Robert "Bob" Price, Speedy O. Long, Harris B. McDowell, Jr., William Temple, Donald M. Fraser), I don't think I was actually the guilty party (although I was the last to edit them back in the Spring when I loaded the Library of Congress THOMAS identifiers for all the congresspeople).

It appears that the mw_template_bot (Wikimedia importer) had a bug that caused it to create these entries on Jun 11, 2008. The bug was apparently fixed quickly, but the bad data never got cleaned up. If you look at the history (http://www.freebase.com/history/view/en/united_states_house_of_representatives) and filter to the appropriate dates, you can see where the problem occurred.

Seatrain Shipbuilding: Seatrain Shipbuilding

2010-01-04T09:22:46.0000Z

Welcome to Freebase. I think you probably wanted to add Seatrain Shipbuilding as a topic, rather than a type. We actually already have a topic for Seatrain Shipbuilding, but it wasn't typed as a Company or much of anything else useful, so it may have been hard to find.

I've added some basic information including a list of ships built there, but please flesh out the details for the company, the yard, or any of the ships that you're familiar with. One of the oil barges, later to be known as the Morris J. Berman, went on to become quite famous (or infamous).

Australian Suburb: SSC

2010-01-04T04:21:14.0013Z

Australian Suburbs can have a "State Suburb Code" according to the ABS.

http://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/mf/2033.0.55.001

This would let us reconcile statistics (population, etc) easily.

Guitarist: Some properties

2010-01-03T21:14:02.0005Z

how bout handedness?

Seatrain Shipbuilding: Seatrain Shipbuilding

2010-01-03T17:15:04.0005Z

Seatrain Shipbuilding Corp. leased a major part of the Brooklyn Navy Yard from 1968-1979. In that time the shipbuilders of Seatrain Shipbuilding, most of comeing from the ranks of the working poor of Brooklyn, built 4 VLCC's [tankers larger than Super tankers], 8 ocean going barges, 1 Ice Breaker Barge and started 2 RO-RO's, work on the Sea Witch to convert it from a burned out container ship into a chemical tanker. The Brooklyn [a VLCC] was the largest ship ever to be built in the Brooklyn Navy Yard and the first VLCC to ever be built in the United States. The Brooklyn was 1,090 feet long, a 140 wide, 90 feet from the keel to the main deck, 70 draft and was 220,000 DWT. The full story can be found in the book Brooklyn Steel-Blood Tenacity by Frank J. Trezza. You can visit www.BrooklynSteel-BloodTenacity.com for more detailed information includeing a slide show inside the Brooklyn Navy Yard.

Music: Thematic catalogs

2010-01-03T03:17:02.0013Z

It looks like few changes are proposed which impact on classical music (a pity), which us where most of this catalog stuff would impact.

I would like to see a single structure for 'classical' music compositions which links to composer (obviously) and catalog. That would be the framework on which other bases (opera, works by composer, songs etc. ). could hang.

tfmorris: US House of Representatives

2010-01-02T23:25:12.0000Z

Thanks for the tip.

Is this in response to something specific that I can go back and review to see what I screwed up?

tfmorris: US House of Representatives

2010-01-02T19:17:13.0006Z

The US House of Representatives should not be both a Government Office and a Government Body. When associating the House with Politicians, place the House under Body not Office. The Title should be United States Representative.

Music: Compositional Forms and Sub-forms

2010-01-02T17:05:45.0013Z

Hi, welcome to Freebase and thanks for your contributions so far, which look good to me.

The only reason is because nobody has added that data yet - please do so.

If you have any further questions, please ask and we'll try and answer them as best we can. Cheers!

Music: Thematic catalogs

2010-01-02T17:01:56.0000Z

I think this is a good idea. Some thoughts:

1) It would indeed be beneficial to link composers with their associated catalogs. It would also be good to enable compositions to be associated with their catalog numbers.

2) It would be better for the type to be called Music Catalog rather than Thematic Catalog. "Music catalog" seems to be the more general term and is consistent with Wikipedia e.g. wikipedia's article on the Köchel catalogue is in the Music catalogs category. (As I understand it, a thematic catalog is a kind of music catalog which indexes work by its opening notes -- But i am not a Musicologist!)

3) Expanding on (1) above, if a composition can only be in one catalog (that being the one associated with the composer) then a text field would suffice e.g. "K525" for Eine kleine Nachtmusik. However, it seems likely that more than one catalog could contain the same work, in which case perhaps there should be (following my proposed terminology) a Music Catalog Entry type to link Compositons with Music Catalogs.

Music: Compositional Forms and Sub-forms

2010-01-02T16:35:43.0013Z

Is there a reason why (for example) the various kinds of concerto, such as "Piano concerto" and "Violin concerto", are not included as sub-forms of "Concerto" (at present only the only sub-form of "Concerto" is "Concerto for Orchestra")?

I am new to freebase. I was thinking of adding these relationships but I don't want to "jump in" and mess things up, so I thought I would ask here.

Airline: Airline designator properties/types

2010-01-02T12:27:28.0013Z

I'm strugggling to understand the value of the IATA/ICAO designator properties on /aviation/airline and the associated types. What does this property/type combination give us that an enumerated property wouldn't?

Film: Gross revenue: New Year, new property added to Film

2009-12-31T23:15:53.0018Z

Example is James Cameron's Avatar, which has the most recently publicized US domestic revenue.

http://www.freebase.com/view/en/avatar_2009

We hope to have this possibly become a property that is updated in an automated process from more than on source in the near future. An open question is whether we should also have a world-wide total gross revenue property as well. As it is, the assumption is US domestic gross revenue which can be also ascertained by the use of US currency in dollars. Japanese gross revenue could be implied for a Japanese-made film if the value is put in with Yen currency chosen.

We will monitor how this value is being used, and in future we may replace it with a CVT that is similar to film release date or film format that would capture specific gross revenue data for each region. Unfortunately there is a specific and very well-publicized mechanism for revenue reporting in the USA (domestic and then later, worldwide) and there are differing systems for other notable film regions (France reports attendance by tickets sold, not income from the tickets themselves, I believe).

Column: Unsyndicated columns?

2009-12-31T20:21:28.0006Z

This looks good. Example: This View of Life

gmackenz: Trying to add some data via freebase loader

2009-12-28T19:26:47.0000Z

Oh, even quicker might be IRC, though many are still out on holiday vacations/sick from the cold/flu that has been making the semantic rounds.

gmackenz: Trying to add some data via freebase loader

2009-12-28T19:06:22.0013Z

I am very unfamiliar with the spreadsheet loader, I haven't used it, & I believe it's still an late-alpha-product (or barely into beta-stage of development).

You would receive a better & more knowledgeable response from the genera support discussion thread (I included that in this response), or better yet, read this wiki page on the Freebase Loader and maybe discuss it on a mail-list.

Column: Unsyndicated columns?

2009-12-28T17:34:37.0000Z

Type created: Collection of columns. Comments requested!

Column: Unsyndicated columns?

2009-12-28T16:56:37.0005Z

Done.

Column: Unsyndicated columns?

2009-12-28T16:24:34.0005Z

Krsalis: If you make me an admin of the columns base, I can create the "Collection of Columns" type and properties.

Fictional Object: Creator

2009-12-28T15:38:42.0000Z

Yes, that seems sensible. Because queries (e.g. through the API) might handle unique and non-unique properties differently, it will take a little time before the change can be made. You can follow the progress here: DA-1022

Fictional Object: Creator

2009-12-28T11:42:34.0005Z

Would it be possible to make the creator property a multiple entry one, as quite a few objects are created by more than one person.

gmackenz: Trying to add some data via freebase loader

2009-12-27T12:54:56.0013Z

And I'm kind of stuck on what to do next.

I have the following columns in the spreadsheet: /type/film/title type/film/creator type/film/location type/film/image type/film/description

And have populated under them.

When I go to the freebase loader though it says it can't find the first column header: /type/film/title

Can you help me?

Thanks, Charles

Musical Release: Barcode & Catalog Number

2009-12-25T08:31:41.0013Z

Thanks Tom for this explanation.

Phil.B

Musical Release: Barcode & Catalog Number

2009-12-24T23:24:13.0000Z

CVT = "compound value type"

If you're familiar with modeling in UML, it correlates to a UML Association Class. If you're not familiar with UML, it's basically a link + associated data. Rather than saying

CD --> ownedBy --> Phil

it says

CD --> ownedBy (fromDate, toDate) --> Phil.

In actual fact, at the most primitive level, it's just a set of nodes and arcs in the graph, but it's useful to think of this particular "clump" of nodes as a single object or link with attributes.

Musical Release: Barcode & Catalog Number

2009-12-24T23:22:13.0006Z

CVT = "compound value type"

If you're familiar with modeling in UML, it correlates to a UML Association Class. If you're not familiar with UML, it's basically a link + associated data. Rather than saying

CD --> ownedBy --> Phil

it says

CD --> ownedBy (fromDate, toDate) --> Phil.

In actual fact, at the most primitive level, it's just a set of nodes and arcs in the graph, but it's useful to think of this particular "clump" of nodes as a single object or link with attributes.

Musical Release: Barcode & Catalog Number

2009-12-24T20:46:16.0005Z

Yes Chris, I agree with you.

Nevertheless, I don't understand what a CVT means. Could you explain, please?

Your idea of ratings and review is very good but I don't know how to implement such 'personal' fields ...

Regards

Phil.B

Musical Release: Barcode & Catalog Number

2009-12-24T19:16:17.0013Z

I’m not going to say whether Freebase should be used for this. I think Freebase should be used for whatever the community successfully uses it. If I were to include personal ownership, I would have a release ownership type, a CVT that correlates a person with a release and things like purchase date. Otherwise, what does it mean to see that To Venus and Back was purchased on 1999-10-20, 2002-05-30, and 2005-07-16? To see that Jane purchased it on 1999-10-20, Bill purchased it on 2002-05-30, and Joe purchased it on 2005-07-16 is arguably a little more useful. Even more useful, users could associate ratings or reviews with their ownership, as well; it would be a way to provide some access control via whatever app is creating those ownership nodes.

Musical Release: Barcode & Catalog Number

2009-12-24T17:47:58.0006Z

Dear Chris,

I admit that my type 'Musical Release (Details)' is redundant. Actually this type is a kind of test and will probably be erased in a near future.

You've noticed that I've included a 'Puchases Date' field because I would like to enter individual ownership information but I realize that FreeBase may not be intended for this purpose. What would be the best way to handle this 'Purchase Date' information?

Regards

Phil.B

Musical Release: Barcode & Catalog Number

2009-12-24T17:05:06.0000Z

I hadn’t noticed the Barcode type. That would be good. However, rather than linking your own Musical Release (details) to Barcode and then co-typing Musical Releases , I think it would be better to co-type Musical Releases as Barcoded Items. In general, your Musical Release (details) seems largely redundant. Original Release Date is present already. What does “Year of this Edition” gain? And “Purchase Date” confuses me; are you proposing to enter individual ownership information? The MusicBrainz ID is already present, as well, via a key, and AMG and Discogs links are best handled as keys into a namespace.

Musical Release: Barcode & Catalog Number

2009-12-24T16:54:31.0013Z

Hi Crism,

and thank you very much for pointing me to the location of the catalog number. Now I understand the goal of the 'Local Release' topic.

I notice that Barcode already exist in FreeBase : http://www.freebase.com/type/schema/base/barcode/barcode This type allow to link an item (i.e. a Musical Release) to a Barcode.

Once again, many thanks for helping me on this topic.

Regards

Phil.B

Musical Release: Barcode & Catalog Number

2009-12-24T14:53:19.0005Z

First, I misspoke above; we do have the catalog number, just not the barcode. Moreover, we have the date and place of Release Events. That really should be enough. See To Venus and Back for an example. I don’t believe we imported this information from MusicBrainz initially.

Musical Release: Barcode & Catalog Number

2009-12-24T14:19:05.0013Z

Yes you're right, the release date could be one way to distinguish 2 releases, but the how to differentiate a UK release and a French release which should be different but released a the same date ?

I think that, as it is implemented at MusicBrainz, the only way to differentiate 2 releases is to specify BarCode, Catalog Number and even Release Date.

Regards

Phil.B

Column: Unsyndicated columns?

2009-12-22T23:21:32.0000Z

Ahhh, OK. +1 on the new type.

Column: Unsyndicated columns?

2009-12-22T02:31:23.0000Z

Wait. Back up. The whole "collection of columns" idea was in response to your first reply to this thread, wherein you resisted the notion of creating topics for each individual column, and instead just "start with the column topic, give it a year range, and link that CVT to the collection", as you put it. My thought was that we could use one model for that approach, which would allow people to connect columns to collections without needing to go ahead and create topics for each individual instance of the column; we could still use the existing publication model alongside that to enable people who want to link individual columns. Yes? Or did I completely misunderstand your previous post?

Column: Unsyndicated columns?

2009-12-22T01:02:26.0009Z

Publication can be used to model a collection of columns where each column article is a published work. For columns that don't have individual titles, I'm guessing the topic name would follow TV talk show episodic name format -- like "January 10, 1996". After all, usually it's not the column in its entirety that's collected, but individual pieces, sometimes within a date range, sometimes grouped by subject matter.

Can you elaborate on how exactly "collection of columns" would link the collection to its content? It's not clear to me what the alternative would be.