[Odrl-version2] Assignee / Assignees - new possible solution

[Daniel Pähler]

Dear all,

Andreas and I talked some more about the Assignee/Assignees-Problem, i.e., the 
fact that the name of the latter does not quite seem to be an elegant 
solution. After looking some more into the capabilities of UML as a modelling 
language as well as XML and RDF as possible encodings, we'd like to present a 
different solution.

We suggest that the separate association "Assignees" be dropped, and that 
"Assignee" be enhanced with an additional property which explains how 
"Assignee" is to be interpreted if the respective Party is a group. The actual 
names for that property and its values are of course subject to discussion, 
but my suggestion would be to name the property "scope", with the possible 
values "group" and "individuals" (which I hope to be self-explaining).

In UML, this can be done by using association classes, e.g. [1]. In XML, a 
simple attribute named "scope" could be added in the "Assignee" element. In 
RDF, a way to express this exists, but I'm too lazy to explain it right now 
;-) .

All in all, the new property would make the association more easily 
understandable, but the drawback is that it bloats the model a little.

I'd like to hear your opinions about this. If anything is still unclear, don't 
hesitate to ask me.

Greetings from Koblenz,
Daniel

[1] http://www.agilemodeling.com/style/classDiagram.htm#Figure2
-- 
Dipl.-Inform. Daniel Pähler

Institute for IS Research
University of Koblenz-Landau
Universitaetsstrasse 1
D-56070 Koblenz
Fon +49-(0)261-287-2644
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