# temporal_keys - attach, serialize, parse and consume temporal keys
#
# Implements the key schema from "The Temporal Context Gap" (position paper draft,
# Sept 2026, section 5.2):
#
#
from __future__ import annotations
from dataclasses import dataclass, field
import re
__version__ = "0.1.0"
def _int_or_none(s):
try:
return int(s)
except (TypeError, ValueError):
return None
@dataclass
class DriftAnnotation:
"""One flagged drifting term, its era range, and (optionally) the era-local sense."""
term: str
year_start: int | None = None
year_end: int | None = None
sense: str | None = None
def encode(self):
parts = [self.term.replace(":", "").replace("|", "")]
if self.year_start is not None or self.year_end is not None:
parts.append(
("" if self.year_start is None else str(self.year_start))
+ "-"
+ ("" if self.year_end is None else str(self.year_end))
)
if self.sense is not None:
parts.append(self.sense.replace(":", "").replace("|", ""))
return ":".join(parts)
@classmethod
def decode(cls, s):
parts = s.split(":")
if len(parts) == 1:
return cls(term=parts[0])
a, b = parts[1].split("-", 1)
return cls(
term=parts[0],
year_start=_int_or_none(a),
year_end=_int_or_none(b),
sense=parts[2] if len(parts) > 2 else None,
)
@dataclass
class TemporalKey:
"""Temporal key attached to one training instance (paper section 5.2).
All fields are optional; presence/absence is itself informative.
"""
time: str | None = None # document creation time (ISO date or ISO month)
fetch: str | None = None # crawl / collection time
src: str | None = None # source class, e.g. "news.wire"
region: str | None = None # locale, e.g. "uk"
register: str | None = None # journalistic / personal / legal / fiction ...
drift: list = field(default_factory=list)
selfanchor: float | None = None # density of internal temporal anchoring (paper section 4, Level 1)
def serialize(self):
attrs = []
for name in ("time", "fetch", "src", "region", "register"):
v = getattr(self, name)
if v is not None:
attrs.append(f"{name}={_sanitize(v)}")
if self.drift:
attrs.append("drift=\"" + "|".join(a.encode() for a in self.drift) + "\"")
if self.selfanchor is not None:
attrs.append(f"selfanchor={self.selfanchor:.2f}")
return ""
def prefix(self):
"""K1 regime: prepend the serialized key to the training instance."""
return self.serialize() + "\n"
@classmethod
def parse(cls, s):
m = re.fullmatch(r"\s*\s*", s, flags=re.DOTALL)
if not m:
raise ValueError(f"not a serialized TemporalKey: {s!r}")
attrs = _tokenize_attrs(m.group(1))
drift = []
if "drift" in attrs:
raw = attrs["drift"].strip('"')
drift = [DriftAnnotation.decode(tok) for tok in raw.split("|") if tok]
return cls(
time=attrs.get("time"),
fetch=attrs.get("fetch"),
src=attrs.get("src"),
region=attrs.get("region"),
register=attrs.get("register"),
drift=drift,
selfanchor=float(attrs["selfanchor"]) if "selfanchor" in attrs else None,
)
def mask(self, rng, p=0.15):
"""K2 regime: return a copy with each field independently dropped with probability p.
Training the model to infer masked fields yields an implicit era-classifier;
the inferred key doubles as a measurement of surviving temporal signal
(paper section 5.3, K2; experiment E2).
"""
masked = TemporalKey(
time=self.time, fetch=self.fetch, src=self.src,
region=self.region, register=self.register,
drift=list(self.drift), selfanchor=self.selfanchor,
)
if rng.random() < p:
masked.time = None
if rng.random() < p:
masked.fetch = None
if rng.random() < p:
masked.src = None
if rng.random() < p:
masked.region = None
if rng.random() < p:
masked.register = None
if rng.random() < p:
masked.selfanchor = None
if rng.random() < p:
masked.drift = []
return masked
def _sanitize(v):
return str(v).replace(" ", "_").replace('"', "").replace("=", "-")
def _tokenize_attrs(s):
out = {}
i = 0
while i < len(s):
while i < len(s) and s[i] == " ":
i += 1
eq = s.find("=", i)
if eq == -1:
break
name = s[i:eq]
if s[eq + 1:eq + 2] == '"':
close = s.find('"', eq + 2)
val = s[eq + 2:close]
i = close + 1
else:
j = s.find(" ", eq + 1)
if j == -1:
j = len(s)
val = s[eq + 1:j]
i = j
out[name] = val
return out
def load_lsc_drift_data(path):
"""Load drift data in a SemEval-2020-Task-1-style JSON layout:
[{"term": "cell",
"senses": [{"year_start": 1850, "year_end": 1970, "sense": "prison-room"},
{"year_start": 1971, "year_end": null, "sense": "biological-unit"}]}]
Any file matching that layout works regardless of its origin; the pipeline
never assumes a specific detector produced it.
"""
import json
with open(path, encoding="utf-8") as f:
records = json.load(f)
for rec in records:
assert "term" in rec and "senses" in rec, f"bad LSC record: {rec!r}"
for sense in rec["senses"]:
assert "year_start" in sense and "year_end" in sense, f"bad sense: {sense!r}"
return records
def annotate_drift(text, lsc_records, doc_year, max_per_doc=8):
"""Flag LSC-tracked terms found in `text`, with the sense local to `doc_year`.
If doc_year is None, every sense of every matched term is returned.
"""
found = []
lowered = text.lower()
for rec in lsc_records:
term = rec["term"]
if not re.search(r"\b" + re.escape(term.lower()) + r"\b", lowered):
continue
for sense in rec["senses"]:
if doc_year is None or _covers(sense, doc_year):
found.append(
DriftAnnotation(
term=term,
year_start=sense["year_start"],
year_end=sense["year_end"],
sense=sense.get("sense"),
)
)
if len(found) >= max_per_doc:
break
return found
def _covers(sense, year):
a = sense["year_start"]
b = sense["year_end"]
return (a is None or year >= a) and (b is None or year <= b)
_SELFANCHOR_PATTERNS = [
re.compile(r"\b(1[5-9]|20)\d{2}\b"),
re.compile(
r"\b(january|february|march|april|may|june|july|august|september|october|"
r"november|december)\s+(1[5-9]|20)\d{2}\b",
re.IGNORECASE,
),
re.compile(r"\bas of\s+(1[5-9]|20)\d{2}\b", re.IGNORECASE),
]
def selfanchor_density(text, words_per_unit=100):
"""Self-anchoring expressions per 100 words.
Higher values mean the text carries its own temporal anchor and is
trustworthy without an external key (paper section 4, Level 1).
"""
words = text.split()
if not words:
return 0.0
n_hits = sum(len(p.findall(text)) for p in _SELFANCHOR_PATTERNS)
return round(100.0 * n_hits / max(1, len(words)), 3)
def make_key(text, lsc_records=None, doc_year=None, **scalar_fields):
"""Convenience constructor: scalar fields + drift annotation + selfanchor."""
return TemporalKey(
drift=annotate_drift(text, lsc_records or [], doc_year) if lsc_records else [],
selfanchor=selfanchor_density(text),
**scalar_fields,
)