meaningattribútum

Meaningattribútum is a theoretical construct used in information semantics to denote the semantic attribute attached to a data item that encodes its intended meaning within a given domain. It is distinct from syntactic attributes such as data type or encoding, and from functional descriptions of an item. The meaningattribútum specifies what a value stands for, the conceptual category it belongs to, and the rules that govern its interpretation, including scope, units, and constraints.

In practice, a meaningattribútum is realized via metadata, ontologies, vocabularies, or data dictionaries that map values to concepts. It may be explicit, as when a data dictionary links a code to a label and a formal concept, or implicit, relying on contextual information and governance policies. Meaningattribútum can be context-dependent and may vary across domains, languages, or schemas, necessitating alignment for interoperability.

Examples include a medical code I10 with a meaningattribútum tied to the ICD-10 concept "hypertension," or a currency attribute where the value "USD" carries a meaningattribútum specifying the ISO 4217 code and monetary semantics. In a dataset of product specifications, the attribute "unit" with value "kg" has a meaningattribútum that defines the metric system interpretation.

Applications include data integration, semantic search, data governance, and interoperability across heterogeneous information systems. Challenges involve keeping metadata up to date, ensuring consistency across ontologies, and handling evolving domain knowledge.

See also: metadata, ontology, semantic interoperability, data governance.