Re: Checking in on Comics work

Hi Henry,

Some great input here, and in you further couple of emails on issues,
variants, etc.

Let me give you a bit of background on how we got to where we are and
answer some of your questions.

The comic proposals were introduced as part of the bibliographic extension (
bib.schema.org) proposed by the Schema Bib Extend W3C Community Group,
which I chair.  You will see the proposal as it took shape documented in
the group Wiki [1
<https://www.w3.org/community/schemabibex/wiki/Periodicals_and_Comics_synthesis>
][2 <https://www.w3.org/community/schemabibex/wiki/Bib.schema.org-1.0>].
Much of this effort was promoted and put together by excellent work from
group member Dan Scott.

The bib extension as it currently stands, and is going through the process
that Dan Brickley has explained, is hopeful the first part of what will
hopefully become an evolving extension to Schema.org.  This being based
upon, demonstrated, need, experience, and usage.  As part of that I have
recently mailed the group
<https://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-schemabibex/2015Sep/0004.html>
as to candidates for next steps.  Your thoughts could easily form part of
that.

As to some of your questions.


   - Are all fields potentially multi-value? - as per the rest of schema.org,
   all properties are both optional, and potentially repeatable.  So for
   example you could say:
   <http://coms.example.com/com1>
        a schema:ComicIssue;
        schema:name "My Favourite Comic";
        schema:isPartOf "Best European Comics";
        schema:isPartOf "Hits from 2010".

   - Issues & Volumes - The Comics proposal was built upon the already
   established Periodicals proposal
   <https://www.w3.org/community/schemabibex/wiki/Article> which contains
   some useful examples demonstrating the isPartOf/hasPart properties
   to interrelate the issues, volumes, and their parent Periodical.  These
   examples are repeated in the Schema.org pages.  Your question suggests to
   me that we should repeat at least one of the example on PublicationIssue
   for ComicIssue.

   - Reliable unique identification - one of the main objectives of using
   Schema.org is make what you describe discoverable. If the unique
   identification you describe could play a role in that, and you have a good
   insight into how well such terms may be used, proposals would be welcome.

   - Variants - I believe the variantCover property was to address the
   artwork side of things.  Could variantName be satisfied by using
   alternateName?

   - Further comments, question, proposals - keep them coming!

~Richard.



Richard Wallis
Founder, Data Liberate
http://dataliberate.com
Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/in/richardwallis
Twitter: @rjw

On 5 October 2015 at 06:29, <hha1@cornell.edu> wrote:

> --------------------
> *From:* Dan Brickley <danbri@google.com>
> *To:* hha1@cornell.edu
> *Cc:* "public-schemabibex@w3.org" <public-schemabibex@w3.org>
> *Sent:* Sunday, October 4, 2015 9:17 PM
> *Subject:* Re: Checking in on Comics work
>
>
> There's no fixed timeline. Basically when we launched v2.1 with the
> bib and auto extensions, our main focus was on getting the underlying
> site infrastructure in a functional state, so we throw together some
> "this might yet change" wording as a warning that the actual content
> of the extensions might yet change. Since all of schema.org tends to
> evolve slowly and continue changing, this should not be too shocking.
>
> It would be really helpful if you can share any feedback on how well
> the current comic-related schemas and vocab match your dataset and
> application...
>
> Dan
>
>
>
> --------------------
>
>
> Thanks, that all makes sense.  I'll take a look at how things line up.  I
> was just looking at ComicIssue and started writing up a few things, but it
> got really long so I think I will start a new thread on each of the longer
> topic.  Here are a few simple questions:
>
> * Are all fields potentially multi-value?  In particular "isPartOf"?
> Issues do sometimes belong to multiple series, and there's a range of cases
> around content simultaneously published in multiple places.  It may be that
> the schema can handle this just by only looking at one situation at a time-
> we don't actually handle these multiple parent cases very well right now,
> but we want to.
>
> * I saw a reference to a "volume number" in the intro text for ComicIssue,
> but I don't see a volume field on either ComicIssue or ComicSeries.  Am I
> missing something?
>
> * Are you interested in comments on information that is not addressed in
> your schema at all?  If I see something that I think is of core importance,
> I will mention that, but there are other things that are a bit farther
> afield.  For instance, we track publisher branding and the brand emblems
> (logo or a text tagline) that appear on issues.  We also track a lot of
> format and physical descriptions (magazine, hardcover, softcover, what kind
> of paper, what kind of binding, etc.).  I guess I'm trying to figure out
> what is in vs out of scope for you.
>
> * One big thing that I don't see is reprint tracking- this is a *huge*
> focus for many of our indexers.  I see that you have translations handled,
> but a lot of people want to find out if there is an attainable publication
> of a particular story (trade paperback collection, or a modern reprint of
> an otherwise prohibitively expensive older comic).
>
> OK, I'll pause here :-)
>
> thanks,
> -henry
>
>