Group references (motivation)

[arnau]

Context

The Public Body Account register has the need to reference other records en bloc. The following document aims to describe the current situation and the problem we are facing so we can think of a solution for it.

https://github.com/openregister/registers-rfcs/blob/group-references/content/group-references/index.md

[arnau]

Let's use this issue to discuss the "motivation" section for the linked document so I can have a complete picture of the need for references between records.

[nacnudus]

There's a third case

* From one record to a group of records that is some subset of a register (or
  registers), where the subset is defined relative to the contents of
  that/those registers.  E.g. you need to reference all schools of type 'grant
  maintained'

[arnau]

I'm thinking that none of the use cases listed in the document express the issue of mixing "en bloc" records with single records.

id, classification, org
1, 32, a:FOO
2, 44, b:QUX
3, 44, b:BAR

Is not the same as

id, classification, org
1, 32, a:FOO
2, 44, b:

Where b: is expressing all records contained in "b" (which for this example are "QUX" and "BAR"). Equally, I think the following example is not saying the same as the first one.

id, classification, org
1, 32, [a:FOO]
2, 44, [b:BAR, b:QUX]

[arnau]

id, classification, org
1, 32, [a:FOO]
2, 44, [b:]

[arnau]

FYI: The discussion for "en bloc" entries, particularly for public body accounts will be addressed separately. This thread then is for mechanisms of referencing resources from a single record.