Re: ISSUE-76: Need feedback on splitting Microdata into separate specification

Julian Reschke wrote:
> Tab Atkins Jr. wrote:
>> For example, it was natural for Microdata to sprout a DOM API to make
>> it easy to work with via script, something which no other metadata
>> embedding syntax has, or has plans to produce afaik.
> 
> I know that there are plans to produce a DOM API for RDFa; not sure how
> far they have processed.

The RDFa API is a mandatory deliverable in the RDFa WG charter (slated
to start in Feb 2010).

If the RDFa WG is approved, this MUST be spec'ed and MUST be
REC-track... in other words - the RDFa API is definitely going to happen. :)

Aryeh Gregor wrote:
> With the status quo, anyone who sees serious problems with either
> microdata or RDFa has reason to try ignoring it and pushing the
> alternative, rather than fixing the problems in the other spec.  For
> instance, a number of people have criticized RDFa's usability on
> various grounds.  Rather than making a serious effort to improve
> RDFa's usability, they've pretty much all just supported microdata and
> hoped RDFa will go away.

Right, but that doesn't mean that the RDFa community hasn't been
listening. In fact, we are taking very firm, methodical steps to address
those concerns in the RDFa WG... here are just a few of the changes that
we're planning on making during the RDFa WG work period:

* Support for full URIs in @about, @rel/@rev, @property, (no namespaces,
no prefixes) - this was something that Julian, Ian and a few others
wanted and we finally found a way to do it that was backwards compatible
and consistent.[1]

* Importing non-namespaced, non-prefixed, vocabulary terms to ease
authoring, effectively enabling every current Microformats vocabulary to
be expressed in RDFa[2]. This was raised by the
no-visible-namespaces/qnames-in-content/easy-authoring folks in WHAT WG,
RDFa TF and HTML WG.

* Implementing a different prefixing mechanism, other than xmlns:.

* Re-organizing and formulating the core RDFa specification such that
implementation in raw byte-stream, SAX, DOM and Infoset-based
environments is clarified.

So, there's a great deal of exciting work that's coming down the
pipeline for RDFa - the RDFa community is moving forward on technical
solutions - RDFa isn't going away.

-- manu

[1]http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-rdf-in-xhtml-tf/2009Nov/0081.html
[2]http://www.w3.org/2009/12/03-rdfa-minutes.html#item03

-- 
Manu Sporny (skype: msporny, twitter: manusporny)
President/CEO - Digital Bazaar, Inc.
blog: Bitmunk 3.2 Launched - The Legal P2P Music Network
http://blog.digitalbazaar.com/2009/11/30/bitmunk-3-2-launched/

Received on Friday, 4 December 2009 21:52:32 UTC