Generic RDF browser?¶

I noticed this post a little while ago: Leo says a generic RDF browser is not possible, eh, ehm, ehhhm. I've been tinkering with Rope, my rdflib+zope combination. Not much to show at the moment, but in the default configuration it was supposed to be somewhat of, eh, a, eh, (generic rdf browser)...

I mostly agree with Leo, you cannot visualise RDF information really attractively without building an interface just for a specific format. But. RDF includes labels for subjects and properties, allowing you to at least provide useful textual feedback. Subclassing is explicit, which helps. My guess was that it would be not too hard to provide a browser-based interface to an RDF format by using rdflib+zope. Just a few queries coupled with a simple formatting of the query results (what value goes in what column of the table, for instance)... Didn't get around to test it, so it's pretty much guesswork at the moment. (I was going to say that it was "pretty much academic at the moment", but being an academic right now :-)...)

Danny Ayers has some useful input, too, the best quote:

Now that depends. One of best bits of RDF is that it allows you to work with partial information. Say I have a property which is declared as a subproperty of dc:description. I already have a suitable renderer for that, so I can at least get a rendering of the content that I know will be at least partially appropriate.

Regarding Danny Ayers: visit the cat section of his website. At least half of those cat photos are just wonderful. And looking at the spider and snake photos makes me feel real comfy here in the Netherlands with about one serious adder bite per century or so :-)