In computer metadata, semantic equivalence is a declaration that two data elements from different vocabularies contain data that has similar meaning. There are three types of semantic equivalence statements:
Class or concept equivalence. A statement that two high level concepts have similar or equivalent meaning. Property or attribute equivalence. A statement that two properties, descriptors or attributes of classes have similar meaning. Instance equivalence. A statement that two instances of data are the same or refer to the same instance.
Example
Assume that there are two organizations, each having a separate data dictionary. The first organization has a data element entry:
<DataElement>
PersonFamilyName
The name of a person shared with other members of their family. <DataElement>
and a second organization has a data dictionary with a data element with the following entry:
<DataElement>
IndividualLastName
The name of an individual person shared with other members of their family. <DataElement>
these two data elements can be considered to have the same meaning and can be marked as semantically equivalent.
See also
Logical equivalence
Metadata
Vocabulary-based transformation
Web Ontology Language (OWL)
References
World Wide Web OWL Language Reference
Universal Data Element Framework Web Site Semantic Equivalency for Standards and Integrations