Preposition

From eg

This is a wiki best practice especially for a somewhat semantic wiki.

In command grammars, preposition control is crucial - words like "for", "as", "of", "to", "from", "by", "via", etc., establish semantic verb/noun/type relationships simply by appearing in a simple phrase:

• "A as B" means real entity A is playing role B
• "C of D" means role C is being played on behalf of entity D
• "E from F" means communication E was created by entity F
• "G for H" means entity G is acting or speaking on behalf of entity H (subtle but different from "of")
• "J by K" means communication or commitment J was made by entity K or will be delivered before date K
• "L to M" means either a time range from date L to date M or a communication or commitment from entity L to entity M
• "N via P" means communication N occurs through or "via" media P.
• "Q has R" means entity Q has trait or characteristic or possession or attribute R

Using a preposition establishes the type of the arguments. This is obvious to anyone who has written code, but a non-programmer has to struggle to control language to this degree. But they must, as readers are going to have all the exact expectations as above, and are surprisingly confused by sloppy language. Whether in tagging or trolling, in an ultra method or contract or credential, the prepositions say it all.

For now a more extensive coverage is visible at openpolitics.ca: preposition with extensive analysis of the implications of use of each preposition. The prepositions has and as are explained more clearly in terms of subject/predicate/object relationships and the use of Living Ontology Web, SPOSE, enacTOR and project Laputa.