[Developers] MQL index property

[Christopher R. Maden]

David Flanagan <david at davidflanagan.com> wrote:
> If the ordering is not to be documented as part of the schema, are you 
> suggesting, then, that users add "sort":"index" to their queries  on the 
> theory that they might be happier with the order things come out in, on 
> the off chance that indices were added when the data was imported?
> 
> Or do you mean to suggest that ordering is never going to be documented 
> or enforced, and so "sort":"index" is unreliable and shouldn't be used?

I am saying that ordering is a feature of data, not of schemata.  In the Freebase client, ordering is exposed when entering or editing property values; it is not mentioned at all in the schema editor.

Not all index values are created by data loading scripts; I manually order data I enter when appropriate, and I am not the only one.

An app writer who cares about ordering should request the index and (if allowing user edits) expose the ability to change them.  Or the writer might impose an explicit sort on some other property, such as an album’s first release date.  However, the app writer should not assume that all orderable data is going to be usefully ordered.  Welcome to the data commons. (-:

~Chris
-- 
Christopher R. Maden
Data Architect
Metaweb Technologies, Inc.
<URL: http://www.metaweb.com/ >