Fix the vc-data-model namespace with https://www.w3.org/ns/vc/v2

[OR13]

In DID Core we have https://www.w3.org/ns/did/v1... in vc-data-model we have https://www.w3.org/2018/credentials/v1... this is confusing for developers.

I propose we fix this with vc-data-model v2 by creating:

https://www.w3.org/ns/vc/v2

[kdenhartog]

This would break a lot of things in validating VC's today. I'm going to propose that we address this in V2 instead and leave it outside the scope of the maintenance WG.

[OR13]

This issue is addressed by: #927

[OR13]

Should be closed pending PR above.

[iherman]

The issue was discussed in a meeting on 2022-09-07

• no resolutions were taken

View the transcript

3.1. Fix the vc-data-model namespace with https://www.w3.org/ns/vc/v2 (issue vc-data-model#758)

See github issue vc-data-model#758.

Kristina Yasuda: Issue: Fix the data model namespace.

Orie Steele: It seems that someone has fixed some parts of this recently.
… There are term definitions that we're working to create.
… We want to be able to read the definitions for those terms.
… You can read them in the registry where they're specified.
… You want to be able to click the link for a term definition and read the definition.
… We should make sure that our term links are clickable.

Ivan Herman: This is exactly what the vocabulary work does.
… Now it's such that if you take the URL of a term, it will go there.
… Temporarily, the links go to the V1 vocabulary.
… Eventually we will point to the official V2 vocabulary.

Orie Steele: I suggest closing after PR is merged.

Ivan Herman: I think this issue can be closed.

Manu Sporny: We should wait until PR is merged.

Kristina Yasuda: We will close it after the PR is merged.

[msporny]

In an attempt to resolve this issue once and for all:

PROPOSAL: Update the location of the Verifiable Credentials Vocabulary files to https://www.w3.org/ns/vc and redirect the old Vocabulary URLs to the new location.

PROPOSAL: Place the new JSON-LD v2 Context at https://www.w3.org/ns/vc/v2.

(controversial) PROPOSAL: Move the old JSON-LD v1 Context to https://www.w3.org/ns/vc/v1 and redirect the old JSON-LD Context URL to the new location.

NOTE: We need to think through if that last one is going to break any existing deployments (it shouldn't, given that we know that redirects work with all known JSON-LD processors that load from the network based on heavy usage of w3id.org, and for the ones that load from static files, they should work as well.

We might want to bikeshed the URL name between "vc" and "credentials". Vote "heart" emoji for "vc" and vote "rocket ship" emoji for "credentials".

[TallTed]

I think encouraging use of the terms in this vocabulary/ontology for all credentials, unverifiable as well as verifiable, would be a goodness, especially if people act on that encouragement. Primarily for this reason, I'd rather credentials than vc, and would be fine with creds if a shorter string is more desirable than the technically incorrect lexical english interpretation.

[iherman]

The issue was discussed in a meeting on 2023-01-11

• no resolutions were taken

View the transcript

3.6. Fix the vc-data-model namespace with https://www.w3.org/ns/vc/v2 (issue vc-data-model#758)

See github issue vc-data-model#758.

Brent Zundel: Next up is 758..
… Fix the VC Data Model namespace..
… Brought up by the previous WG..

Manu Sporny: We should not do this. The URL can be wrong..

Manu Sporny: This PR establishes a new JSON-LD context location: #1003.

Manu Sporny: There is an open PR. It's 1003..

Manu Sporny: new URL is: https://www.w3.org/ns/credentials/v2.

Manu Sporny: This PR specifies a new URL..

Orie Steele: +1 to the PR that removes 2018 from the context URLs.....

Manu Sporny: NS/Credentials should be used..

Ivan Herman: We may mix up things. Are we talking about the URL for the context or the vocabulary?.
… The PR is about the LD context, the issue about the vocabulary..

Orie Steele: I am in favor of removing 2018 from "both places"..

Manu Sporny: There are three things..
… One URL is about the LD context. No legacy there..
… The other one is the human readable vocab. Should NS/credentials..

Orie Steele: +1 Manu.

Orie Steele: Lets fix the easy ones first.... but I am in favor of fixing this everywhere.

Manu Sporny: The next issue is changing the term URLs..

Ivan Herman: We should accept that there is a bad URL for the terms..
… There has been ugly URLs in the past. We should be careful to change them..

Orie Steele: -1 Ivan... I don't agree..

Manu Sporny: +1 Ivan, agree... no one but developers see those URLs and shouldn't care..

Manu Sporny: (there are also variations of what we could do here).

Manu Sporny: +1 to what Ivan says above ^.

Orie Steele: -1, and would like to discuss this in depth..

Brent Zundel: Ending the meeting..

---

[brentzundel]

Pretty sure the above line was a minor scribe error:

Manu Sporny: We should not do this. The URL can be wrong..

and it should read:

Manu Sporny: We should do this, but the URL may be wrong.

[iherman]

Pretty sure the above line was a minor scribe error:

Manu Sporny: We should not do this. The URL can be wrong..

and it should read:

Manu Sporny: We should do this, but the URL may be wrong.

I have changed the minutes.

[iherman]

I am not sure where we are with this issue, but it did come in conjunction with #1049. There were several versions popping up, all aiming at creating a new URL for the credentials vocabulary (which is the v2 of this vocabulary). Alternatives that did come up are:

• https://www.w3.org/ns/vc/
  But that does not sound right, because that vocabulary (at least at the moment) is for credentials and not verifiable credentials (the crucial proof property is not part of that vocabulary)
• https://www.w3.org/ns/credentials/
  That does sound more feasible and places the vocabulary alongside the context file. One possible push-back may come from W3C: the term "credentials" is extremely general, and it is feasible that other groups would like to use this term. We should not claim exlusive ownership of this subdirectory of /ns
• https://www.w3.org/ns/credentials/vocab/
  A variant of the previous, which avoids the possible ownership problems. (This is my addition to the lot.)

If we decide to move the URL to /nsthan I would vote for the 3rd option. In any case it would be good to settle this alongside #1049.

However, I am sensitive to the argument in #758 (comment). My instinctive reaction to the original issue is that we should not change the URL of an existing vocabulary. Yes, we created a v2 version of the vocabulary, but that was just a cleanup of v1, retaining all existing term URL-s (albeit possibly in a deprecated form). In this respect it is not, strictly speaking, a new version, just a cleanup. The fact that the URL "is not nice" is not a good enough argument to change it for a vocabulary (no issuer has to type that URL, it is hidden by the context file), and may create more confusion in the Linked Data land than necessary.

My proposal is to close this issue without any change, ie, live with the URL https://www.w3.org/2018/credentials/ for the vocabulary (which is the current URL).

Cc @msporny @dlongley @pchampin @OR13 @TallTed

---

B.t.w., this type of discussion is as old as RDF/Linked Data. There were requests countless times to change the URL for the core RDF vocabulary that nobody, including yours truly, remembers: http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#. Similar for the foaf vocabulary URL: http://xmlns.com/foaf/0.1/. But it has never been done for the same reasons: the chaos it would lead to is just not worth it.

[OR13]

I don't understand the proposal.

Is it to use /2018/ in IRIs for terms defined in 2023?

Or is it to use /2018/ for terms defined in v1, and do something better for terms defined in V2?

[TallTed]

@OR13 — The proposal is to use the /2018/ path for both old v1 terms (which were not defined in the year 2018, but by a group which started its work in that year) and new v2 terms.

[iherman]

@OR13 — The proposal is to use the /2018/ path for both old v1 terms (which were not defined in the year 2018, but by a group which started its work in that year) and new v2 terms.

Exactly.

@OR13 it is correct that the terms defined in v1 should definitely stay in the /2018/ URLs. We could define a separate vocabulary for the specifically v2 terms, but the only result would be to create confusion for no good reasons by artificially separate the terms.

[OR13]

So this should be changed:

https://github.com/w3c/vc-data-model/blob/main/contexts/credentials/v2#L4

from:

"@vocab": "https://www.w3.org/ns/credentials/issuer-dependent#",

to

"@vocab": "https://www.w3.org/2018/credentials/issuer-dependent#",

No other changes are implied by the proposal.

And this issue can be closed after the above is fixed ^ ?

Note that the context URL is a different can can use /ns...

did I capture this correctly?

[iherman]

I do not have a problem keeping "@vocab": "https://www.w3.org/ns/credentials/issuer-dependent#". That URL is new, there is no history behind it, and it does make sense to keep it alongside the context file which is also in /ns. My problem is with the original proposal, namely to use https://www.w3.org/ns/vc/v2 (or https://www.w3.org/ns/credentials/for the vocabulary URL, because that particular ship has sailed several years ago.

In practice, my proposal is to close this issue without any further actions. What has to be done, in my view, is in #1049.

[OR13]

@iherman Ahh ok, I think this thread is pretty massively stale at this point.

I suggest we close this issue to avoid future confusion.

[OR13]

I suggest we close this.

[iherman]

The issue was discussed in a meeting on 2023-04-11

• no resolutions were taken

View the transcript

1.8. Fix the vc-data-model namespace with https://www.w3.org/ns/vc/v2 (issue vc-data-model#758)

See github issue vc-data-model#758.

Kristina Yasuda: "Fix the vc-data-model namespace with https://www.w3.org/ns/vc/v2".

Orie Steele: this is a very old issue, suggest close - lots of back and forth with manu/ivan - have since added ns context, etc.

Manu Sporny: +1 to close.

Orie Steele: continued to add new terms to iri space (2018) and we will be stuck there like IRIs and that is best we can do with RDF.

Kristina Yasuda: ok to close?.

Brent Zundel: notes that objection to closing on call is only to do with tooling.

[iherman]

The issue was discussed in a meeting on 2023-04-11

• no resolutions were taken

View the transcript

1.8. (issue vc-data-model#758)

See github issue vc-data-model#758.

Kristina Yasuda: "Fix the vc-data-model namespace with https://www.w3.org/ns/vc/v2".

Orie Steele: this is a very old issue, suggest close - lots of back and forth with manu/ivan - have since added ns context, etc.

Manu Sporny: +1 to close.

Orie Steele: continued to add new terms to iri space (2018) and we will be stuck there like IRIs and that is best we can do with RDF.

Kristina Yasuda: ok to close?.

Michael Prorock: misc discussion around if you opened it you can close it.

Brent Zundel: notes that objection to closing on call is only to do with tooling.