Termfrom

Termfrom is a coined term used in information extraction and data transformation to describe the action of selecting a term from a defined source according to a predicate or context. It is not a standard operator in mainstream programming languages, but appears in some domain-specific languages and templating systems that model extraction pipelines.

Syntax and behavior in common representations is described as termfrom(source, criterion, index). This form returns the index-th element that satisfies the given criterion from the specified source. If no element meets the criterion, the result is null or an empty value. The concept emphasizes selecting a single term from a sequence of tokens, a list of terms, or a structured field rather than processing the whole collection.

Examples illustrate its usage in pseudo-code. termfrom(doc.tokens, isNoun, 2) yields the second noun in a document. termfrom(corpus, hasRelation('concept'), 1) returns the first term that participates in the relation labeled 'concept'. In templating contexts, termfrom can be used to bind a term from a data source to a template location, enabling dynamic content generation.

Variants and related concepts include term extraction, term selection, and term projection. In practice termfrom operates alongside tokenization, filtering, and normalization, and its exact semantics can vary between implementations. It is often contrasted with broader extraction or query operations that return lists rather than a single selected term.

History and usage notes: termfrom originated in discussions of lightweight extraction DSLs and templating rules. It remains a niche concept without widespread standardization, and its behavior can be ambiguous across systems unless precisely defined. See also extraction, projection, templating, and domain-specific query languages.