Re: ISSUE-55: Re-enable @profile in HTML5 (draft 1)

Hi Manu,

A productive weekend, you and Julian have had. :)

Here are a few comments for you.

In section 1.1, you say that @profile is a "means to specify the
location of one or more meta data profiles", but since there is no
requirement for the document to be retrieved, then there is no way to
mandate that the document actually exists -- and indeed, that's part
of the usefulness of @profile.

On section 2.1: there is already a W3C version string format, and I
don't think we should invent another one. Specifically, the '+' has a
special meaning in feature strings, so I don't think you should use it
as a separator. You don't actually need the '+' as a separator anyway,
since the names of the interfaces always begin with a letter, and the
version numbers always begin with a number.

(You have them both as NCNames, but since all of your versions are
numbers, then I assume that's a typo.)

This might also allow authors to use the more flexible alternative:

  @version="RDFa 1.0"

i.e., without either "HTML" or "XHTML".

In section 2.2, I think it's incorrect to have @rel="profile" since by
the time this value is parsed, it will be too late in the sequence. In
other words, @rel="profile" it is not equivalent to @profile, since
the latter can be read before parsing begins, whilst the former is
read as part of normal processing.

(It's like putting the MIME type or character encoding into the
document; they are metadata about the transmission envelope, so by the
time the document has been transmitted, it's too late to act on the
values.)

Regards,

Mark

On Mon, Sep 28, 2009 at 1:03 AM, Manu Sporny <msporny@digitalbazaar.com> wrote:
> I volunteered for an action to produce a draft document that included
> @profile in HTML5:
>
> http://www.w3.org/html/wg/tracker/actions/144
>
> The document attempts to address the long standing ISSUE-55:
>
> http://www.w3.org/html/wg/tracker/issues/55
>
> After speaking with Julian over the weekend, we explored the possibility
> that perhaps the document should focus on the concept of extending
> processing behavior for user agents via @profile and @version. Perhaps
> even stating that we'd like to move away from @profile (because it
> hasn't been used as much as we'd like), toward something that is simpler
> and has been used in both XHTML and RDFa: a specifically formatted
> @version attribute.
>
> We also wanted to provide backwards compatability for GRDDL,
> Microformats, DC-HTML and other applications of @profile on HEAD. The
> HTML+RDFa spec was already defining @version and @profile, so I moved
> them out of that spec and into a separate document of their own, per
> advice given on the HTML WG telecon two weeks ago.
>
> This is a very rough conceptual draft and thus we could end up adopting
> all of it or none of it. It attempts to find a delicate balance between
> the advice given via the HTML WG, WHAT WG, and RDFa TF:
>
> http://html5.digitalbazaar.com/specs/html5-epb.html
>
> I expect that there will be arguments around these concepts:
>
> 1. Whether or not we should make @profile obsolete but conforming (this
>   draft does that, as does the base HTML5 specification). We don't have
>   to obsolete it, though I think it would be a good idea.
> 2. Whether or not we should depend on <link rel="profile" href="..."
>   to specify profile relationships to the current document. GRDDL
>   and Microformats depend on either this or #1.
> 3. Whether or not we should obsolete @version. RDFa would like to keep
>   @version.
> 4. Whether or not we should adopt a new markup format for @version in
>   order to make language design easier in the future while also making
>   it easier for authors. This may address WHAT WG's issue with
>   @version.
> 5. Whether or not the world would be a better place if Kanye West never
>   rose to fame.
>
> Feedback on the direction of the draft would be great. Fire away! *ducks*
>
> -- manu
>
> --
> Manu Sporny (skype: msporny, twitter: manusporny)
> President/CEO - Digital Bazaar, Inc.
> blog: The Pirate Bay and Building an Equitable Culture
> http://blog.digitalbazaar.com/2009/08/30/equitable-culture/
>
>

Received on Monday, 28 September 2009 08:59:31 UTC