multiple fields mapping to one field

[wdduncan]

Do we have terms to handle when multiple fields map to a single field.

For example, it is common to see dates broken out into year, month, day field; e.g.: collection_year, collection_month, collection_day. But these may map to single field; e.g.: collection_date.

cc @cmungall

[matentzn]

I think this makes only sense if we decided to handle data values; we we currently do not

(A->"some val")

I thinks this invities a lot of scope creep.. Do you have a use case you are trying to meet?

[wdduncan]

I understand that scope creep is difficult to manage.
Yes, the collection date example I gave is an actual use case for my data.

[matentzn]

Yeah for your case (A->"some val") I would say maybe better not SSSOM, for now. It really should be about TERM->TERM, or perhaps TERM->CLASSEXPRESSION, but anything else would be really too much.. Lets see what @cmungall says.

[wdduncan]

I am not sure I am understanding what you mean by (A -> "som val"). I'm not talking about literals. These are the actual column names (which I will simply call terms) in a table. E.g.: collection_year: 2010 collection_month: 10 collection_day: 31

I am not talking about the literals "2010", "10", "31". But the terms: collection_year, collection_month, collection_day.

In another terminology (MIxS), the only term that exists for such dates has one name: collection_date. E.g.: collection_date: 2010-10-31

So, collection_year does not match collection_date, but it is still related.

In another example, one database has columns/terms latitude and longitude, but MIxS has only one term: lat_lon. Again, related, but not exact.

I can think of other examples, but does this make sense?

[matentzn]

Ah= nowww I understand! Sorry for being daft. Ok. That is a very interesting case.. Never thought of it! So I change my opinion to 'i dont know'.