Standardized Term Names

[Alexander Diehl]

Jen and Midori,

Thank you for your replies.  Yes, I would prefer these term names to 
return to their original formulations.  I would also argue that it 
should be unnecessary to change term names to enable obol to  figure 
them out in cases where obol can easily read the term parentage as 
well as any human.  I would expect this to be a part of the obol 
algorithm already, though perhaps the program is not that 
sophisticated.

I have no objection to creating synonyms that all end in "cell 
differentiation."  In fact, one could imagine a distinct type of 
synonym specifically intended for parsing by computer, that would be 
marked as such.  However, even in this case the term name and 
definition would hold precedence as far as the actual meaning of the 
term.

I agree term names should make sense when displayed alone, which is 
the point here.  But anyone seriously interested in using the GO 
should know to look beyond the term name alone, to the definition and 
position in the DAG if they don't immediately understand the name, 
and we should train our users to do so.

-- Alex

At 9:59 AM +0000 2/18/05, J Clark wrote:
>>better as a synonym than as the term name! so if obol needs it, OK
>>
>>(I do think Alex has a point, that actual human beings should be 
>>able to suss it out ... but computers aren't as smart as us.)
>
>Cool. I'll wait for Alex to respond and if he's happy that I'll go ahead.
>
>Jen
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>--
>EMBL - European Bioinformatics Institute,
>Gene Ontology Consortium,
>and Wolfson College, Cambridge.
>http://www.ebi.ac.uk/~jclark/


-- 
Alexander Diehl, Ph.D.
Scientific Curator
Mouse Genome Informatics
The Jackson Laboratory
600 Main Street
Bar Harbor, ME  04609

email:  adiehl at informatics.jax.org
work:  +1 (207) 288-6427
fax:  +1 (207) 288-6131