The document compares triple stores and property graphs. Triple stores follow the W3C standard and have stable structure but can have overhead from reification. Property graphs do not have a standard yet but allow flexible things and strings as nodes and edges without reification overhead through coding by convention. While easy to write, query and understand, property graphs are subject to interpretation errors in tracing provenance chains.

1. Things and Strings
TRIPLE STORES AND PROPERTY GRAPHS

2. The Knowledge Graph
TRIPLE STORE
1. “German Precision”
2. Academic Provenance
3. Things, not Strings
4. Pro: W3C Standard
1. Stable and Known
5. Con: Reification and Purism
1. Overhead
PROPERTY GRAPH
1. “Wild Barbarians”
2. Industry Provenance
3. Things and Strings
4. Pro: Hashing over Reification
1. Influenced by “Coding by Convention” camp
5. Con: No Standard Yet
1. O.M.G.? Oasis?

3. Reification
LOGICAL ACTUAL

4. Reification
It gets worse
Anand says:
“Hamlet was written in 1854”
And he knows this because
“Anand was influenced by a Wikipedia
article that Craig edited”

5. Property Graphs
• Unlimited key/value at any vertex or edge in
the graph
• The order of properties (in this case)
determines the provenance chain order
• Subject to interpretation error
• Easy, easy, easy
• Easy to write
• Easy to query
• Easy to understand
• Convention over Configuration