Re: XHTML2 and metainformation

Hi

This might also be of interest to the DC General list?

  http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/wa.exe?A0=dc-general

On Fri 18-Apr-2003 at 01:42:23AM -0400, Ernest Cline wrote:
> 
> I am troubled by the way that metainformation is being handled in 
> XHTML2. My main concern comes from the fact that the working draft 
> allows for multiple profiles, which is a change from previous (X)HTML. 
> The problem is that is possible that two profiles could use the same 
> metainformation property name for two separate purposes. The example I 
> am going to use makes use of one existing profile and one created (but 
> logical) one to show what I mean.
> 
> In the Dublin Core metainformation scheme the attributes are indicated 
> by the prefixing the property names by "DC.".  For example, in an XHTML 
> version of a comic book we could have:
>   <meta name="DC.Publisher">DC Comics</meta>
> 
> However, in the periodical industry, the term publisher refers to a 
> person resposible for overseeing the details of getting a particular 
> book published, not a company and if DC Comics were to develop its own 
> metainformation properties, they might decide to also prefix everything 
> with "DC." also and so want to have on that page:
>   <meta name="DC.Publisher">Karen Berger</meta>
> 
> This creates a problem.

Actually there isn't a problem if you follow this draft:

  Expressing Qualified Dublin Core in HTML/XHTML meta elements
  http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/metadata/dcmi/dcq-html/

Because a link rel is used to indicate the namespace:

  <link rel="schema.DC" href="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" />

I don't really have any comments of your XHTML 2 proposals that
follow.

Chris

> A second and minor concern is that in my opinion the profile attribute 
> should be defined in the Metainformation Module and not the Structure 
> Module.
> 
> Here is a proposal of how to resolve both problems.
> 
> <ml profile="http://www.dublincore.org">
>   <mi name="Publisher">DC Comics</mi>
> </ml>
> <ml profile="http://www.dccomics.com">
>   <mi name="Publisher">Karen Berger</mi>
> </ml>
> 
> The idea is that <ml> (or whatever it is decided to call the element) 
> is a list of metainformation items which share common attributes such 
> as a profile while <mi> represents one such metainformation item. Since 
> uniqueness is now assured by the assignment of both a profile and a 
> name, kuldgy schemes such as applying a prefix to the property name 
> would no longer be necessary.
> 
> Formal Specification:
> 
> The ml element
> Attributes: Common, profile=URI
> MCM: mi+
> 
> The mi element
> Attributes: Common, name=NMTOKEN
> MCM: PCDATA
> 
> 

-- 
Chris Croome                               <chris@webarchitects.co.uk>
web design                             http://www.webarchitects.co.uk/ 
web content management                               http://mkdoc.com/

Received on Friday, 18 April 2003 08:00:57 UTC