Ensure that multiple subjects point to same list of blank nodes

Consider the following instance of SomeClass:

 instances:some_thing1
                a semapi:SomeClass ;
                semapi:hasChainTo (
                      [ ... ] [ ... ] [ ... ]
                ) .

I need every instance (some_thing2, some_thing3, etc.) to have its hasChainTo property point at the same list of blank nodes (as in there is only one copy of it). I need to maintain the list of blank nodes syntax because the chains get very deep and this syntax is very fluid for writing out each chain (for SomeClass2, SomeClass3, etc.).

If I simply make a base class and subClassOf from it, the hasChainTo property inherits but not the object it's pointing to. This intuitively makes sense but I need the other behavior.

How can this be accomplished?

Solution

If you want to refer to the same thing from multiple nodes in the graph, you should give it a URI. It doesn't have to be a full http: URI - you could use a UUID:

instances:some_thing_1
  semapi:hasChainTo <urn:uuid:12345>.
instances:some_thing_2
  semapi:hasChainTo <urn:uuid:12345>.
instances:some_thing_3
  semapi:hasChainTo <urn:uuid:12345>.

<urn:uuid:12345>
  semapi:chain (
    [ .. ] [ .. ] [ .. ]
  ).

Don't confuse RDFS/OWL sub-classes with inheritance of state and behaviour in object-oriented languages. The class hierarchy in RDFS is for classifying nodes - i.e. assigning them to a class, where a class is some set of resources. There is no direct equivalent of the code-reuse you get from inheritance in languages like Java.