contenirrelated

Contenirrelated is a coined term used in information organization and knowledge graphs to denote a composite relation that combines containment and semantic relatedness between two entities. The word merges contenir, the French verb for “to contain,” with related, signaling a link that carries both a part-whole relationship and a thematic connection.

In formal terms, contenerrelated is a directed binary relation from a container to a containee. It is intended to carry two aspects: a containment component that reflects a part-whole or enclosure relationship, and a relatedness component that signals meaningful topical or semantic association between the two items. In graph-based models, this is often represented as an edge with attributes such as containmentStrength (0 to 1) and relatednessScore (0 to 1), enabling nuanced queries that consider both structure and meaning.

Applications span library catalogs, digital repositories, packaging and inventory systems, and knowledge bases where items are stored within larger containers and are thematically linked to those containers. For example, a digital repository (container) might contenerrelated a dataset and its subcollections to indicate both that the items reside inside the repository and that they pertain to its curation focus. Another example is a book (container) containing chapters (containees) that are not only physically inside but also thematically aligned with the book’s subject.

Contenirrelated remains a specialized, experimental concept and is not yet standardized across major ontology or metadata frameworks. When used, it should be defined explicitly within a data model to avoid ambiguity with separate contains and related-to relations. See also: containment, relatedness, ontology design.