- From: Tom Morris <bbtommorris@gmail.com>
- Date: Fri, 18 May 2007 22:19:59 +0100
- To: public-html@w3.org
Gervase Markham wrote: > Also, "rel=nofollow" almost seems too simple to be a microformat. Is > "autocomplete=off" a microformat too? We seem to be stretching the > definition of "microformat" quite a long way, such that it is losing > meaning. Two observations: 1. rel=tag is also a microformat, but the way it works is that it can be used inside other more complex 'compound' microformats, like hReview. 2. The only reliable working definition of microformat is basically whatever goes through the microformats community process. I think that microformats are very useful (and cool), but they are a distraction for the HTML WG. Microformats came about as a result of the wise decision to allow HTML4 and XHTML1 to have a wide latitude in deciding expressing semantic data. This is something that RDF-in-(X)HTML approaches have built upon with eRDF and GRDDL. We should be extremely sure before shutting off any opportunity for people to express data within HTML, as the limits of this are still far from reach. With regard to microformats, perhaps the most appropriate response would be something as follows: "Various approaches have been taken with regard to embedding data and meta-data within HTML. The W3C maintain a list of these at <wherever>. User Agents may consider providing extra functionality based on these standards." Yours, -- Tom Morris http://tom.opiumfield.com/blog/
Received on Sunday, 20 May 2007 15:22:51 UTC