Swish

Swish: Semantic Web Inference Scripting in Haskell

This program is a simple skeleton for constructing Semantic Web [1] inference tools in Haskell, using the RDF graph and several RDF parsers (at present Notation 3 and NTriples).

It might be viewed as a kind of embroyonic CWM [2] in Haskell, except that the intent is that Haskell will be used as a primary language for defining inferences. As such, Swish is an open-ended toolkit for constructing new special-purpose Semantic Web applications rather than a closed, self-contained general-purpose SW application. As such, it is part of another experiment along the lines described in [3].

The script format used by Swish is described in Swish.Script.

Users wishing to process RDF data directly may prefer to look at the following modules; Swish.RDF, Swish.RDF.Parser.Turtle, Swish.RDF.Parser.N3, Swish.RDF.Parser.NTriples, Swish.RDF.Formatter.Turtle, Swish.RDF.Formatter.N3 and Swish.RDF.Formatter.NTriples.

1. Semantic web: http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/
2. CWM: http://www.w3.org/2000/10/swap/doc/cwm.html
3. Motivation: http://www.w3.org/2000/10/swap/doc/Motivation.html
4. Notation 3: http://www.w3.org/TeamSubmission/2008/SUBM-n3-20080114/
5. Turtle: http://www.w3.org/TR/turtle/
6. RDF: http://www.w3.org/RDF/

Notes

I anticipate that this module may be used as a starting point for creating new programs rather then as a complete program in its own right. The functionality built into this code is selected with a view to testing the Haskell modules for handling RDF rather than for performing any particular application processing (though development as a tool with some broader utility is not ruled out).

With the following in ghci:

>>> :m + Swish
>>> :set prompt "swish> "

then we can run a Swish script (format described in Swish.Script) by saying:

>>> runSwish "-s=script.ss"
ExitSuccess

or convert a file from Turtle to NTriples format with:

>>> runSwish "-ttl -i=foo.ttl -nt -o=foo.nt"
ExitSuccess

You can also use validateCommands by giving it the individual commands, such as

>>> let Right cs = validateCommands ["-ttl", "-i=file1.ttl", "-c=file2.ttl"]
>>> cs
[SwishAction: -ttl,SwishAction: -i=file1.ttl,SwishAction: -c=file2.ttl]
>>> st <- runSwishActions cs
>>> st
The graphs do not compare as equal.

Documentation

data SwishStatus

Status of the processor

Constructors

SwishSuccess

successful run

SwishGraphCompareError

graphs do not compare

SwishDataInputError

input data problem (ie format/syntax)

SwishDataAccessError

data access error

SwishArgumentError

command-line argument error

SwishExecutionError

error executing a Swish script

Instances

Enum SwishStatus

Eq SwishStatus

Show SwishStatus

data SwishAction

Represent a Swish action. At present there is no way to create these actions other than validateCommands.

Instances

Show SwishAction

runSwish :: String -> IO ExitCode

Parse and run the given string as if given at the command line. The "quiet", "version" and "help" options are ignored.

runSwishActions :: [SwishAction] -> IO SwishStatus

Execute the given set of actions.

displaySwishHelp :: IO ()

Write out the help for Swish

splitArguments :: [String] -> ([String], [String])

Return any arguments that need processing immediately, namely the "help", "quiet" and "version" options.

validateCommands :: [String] -> Either (String, SwishStatus) [SwishAction]

Given a list of command-line arguments create the list of actions to perform or a string and status value indicating an input error.