Provenance and Maintenance

Note

Derived from canonical docs/CONVENTIONS.md in the dfo-salmon-ontology repo.

Minimal provenance pattern

Use these fields consistently:

  • IAO:0000115 — term definition text (required)
  • IAO:0000119 — textual source/citation for definition (optional)
  • dcterms:source — resolvable URI for source material (optional but preferred)
  • rdfs:isDefinedBy <https://w3id.org/gcdfo/salmon> (required)

Keep identifiers and codes distinct

  • dcterms:identifier = textual internal identifier (when used)
  • skos:notation = scheme code (typed literal)
  • labels are human-facing and should not carry machine IDs/codes

Maintenance cadence

For every material ontology update:

  1. update/add terms with required annotations
  2. validate consistency and quality checks
  3. regenerate docs/release artifacts
  4. update DSU guidebook pages if conventions changed
  5. communicate downstream impact (salmon data package templates, SPSR guidance, validators)

Quality checks before merge