Re: Language in schema.org

I've been personally suggesting allowing multiple itemprops, even for unique
properties, as long as they have different html5 lang= attribute values.
Even supporting that capability on only Thing/name would cover a lot of use
cases without much added complexity.

-jason

On Tuesday, October 25, 2011, Jeni Tennison <jeni@jenitennison.com> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> How should multi-lingual content be handled in schema.org expressed in
microdata?
>
> Language is not part of the microdata data model, and microdata
vocabularies must provide vocabulary-specific mechanisms for supporting
values that have an associated language [1].
>
> The schema.org vocabulary supports publishers indicating the language of
the content of a CreativeWork through the inLanguage property [2]. From what
I can tell, that's the only language-related schema.org property.
>
> How does schema.org deal with multi-lingual values for other properties?
For example, I have a web page [3] which lists items of legislation that are
available in both English and Welsh; it has the markup (simplified for this
example)
>
> <tr class="oddRow">
>  <td class="bilingual en">The A477 Trunk Road (Backe Road Junction to
Llanddowror, Carmarthenshire) (Temporary Traffic Restrictions and
Prohibition) Order 2011</td>
>  <td rowspan="2">
>    <a href="/wsi/2011/2469/contents/made">2011 No. 2469</a>
>  </td>
>  <td rowspan="2">Wales Statutory Instruments</td>
> </tr>
> <tr class="oddRow">
>  <td class="bilingual cy" lang="cy" xml:lang="cy">Gorchymyn Cefnffordd yr
A477  (Cyffordd Ffordd Bace i Landdowror, Sir Gaerfyrddin) (Cyfyngiadau a
Gwaharddiad Traffig Dros Dro) 2011</td>
> </tr>
>
> I'd like to indicate that these two table rows related to the same
CreativeWork and that it has two titles, one in English and one in Welsh.
There doesn't seem to be a way to do this in schema.org.
>
> One way that could work would be to introduce a
http://schema.org/LanguageString (or something less horrendously named) type
and use that as an acceptable value for any natural language property, such
as name:
>
> <tr class="oddRow" itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/CreativeWork"
itemref="welsh">
>  <td class="bilingual en">
>    <span itemprop="name" itemscope itemtype="
http://schema.org/LanguageString">
>      <meta itemprop="lang" content="en">
>      <span itemprop="value">The A477 Trunk Road (Backe Road Junction to
Llanddowror, Carmarthenshire) (Temporary Traffic Restrictions and
Prohibition) Order 2011</span>
>    </span>
>  </td>
>  <td rowspan="2">
>    <a itemprop="url" href="/wsi/2011/2469/contents/made">2011 No. 2469</a>
>  </td>
>  <td rowspan="2">Wales Statutory Instruments</td>
> </tr>
> <tr class="oddRow" id="welsh">
>  <td class="bilingual cy" lang="cy" xml:lang="cy">
>    <span itemprop="name" itemscope itemtype="
http://schema.org/LanguageString">
>      <meta itemprop="lang" content="cy">
>      <span itemprop="value">Gorchymyn Cefnffordd yr A477  (Cyffordd Ffordd
Bace i Landdowror, Sir Gaerfyrddin) (Cyfyngiadau a Gwaharddiad Traffig Dros
Dro) 2011</span>
>    </span>
>  </td>
> </tr>
>
> Might schema.org introduce a LanguageString class or is there some other
method of supplying the language of a property value that's supported by
schema.org?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Jeni
>
> [1] http://www.w3.org/Bugs/Public/show_bug.cgi?id=14470#c1
> [2] http://schema.org/CreativeWork
> [3] http://www.legislation.gov.uk/wsi/2011
> --
> Jeni Tennison
> http://www.jenitennison.com
>
>
>