In webposible I have write some post about Microformatos Dublin Core in spanish, but now, I’m try in English.
I’m thinking about microformats using the elements of DCMI since the last year. I’m believe that the microformats are a good idea, because the metadata are «visible» for the people, and the machines can easily understand, expecially when the value of the class or id atributes are evident,… like the elements of DCMI.
In October, I’m publish a simple web-tool: Dublin Core Metadata Gen developed in XHTML and Javascript. Today the tool only is available in spanish and catalan, but I can translate to english (someday).
The user put in form the information, and the tool generate 3 kinds of metadata using the elements of DCMI: clasics «meta» tags, the content of an RDF file, and microformat using Dublin Core.
In my opinion, the best code in (X)HTML to write microformats is the definition list, and I use it.
There are documentation explain the microformats, examples, and a «expecification» to use it. In spanish, too. You can see at Microformatos Dublin Core.
A little example of HTML code of microformat using Dublin Core, could be:
[dl class="dublincore"]
[dt]Author of the Book[/dt]
[dd][a href = " http://www.w3.org/People/Berners-Lee/ "
class="creator"]Tim Berners-Lee[/a][/dd]
[dt]Title[/dt]
[dd class="title"]Weawing the Web[/dd]
[dt]Publisher of the original version[/dt]
[dd class="publisher" lang="en"]Harper Collins[/dd]
[dt]Publisher of spanish version[/dt]
[dd class="publisher" lang="es"]Siglo XXI[/dd]
[/dl]
We using the class atributes with the name of dublincore to «define» the microformat of Dublin Core, and the elements of DCMI like in «meta» or a RDF file. With the definition list, we «define» a term, and then we use «class» with the DCMI elements for the definition. The metadata appears three times: in the definition list, in the «class» names, and in the text.
One of the «secret» of the microformats appears in the W3C Recomendation of HTML, in the section 7.5.2 Element identifiers: the id and class attributes: The «class» and «id» atributes cam use For general purpose processing by user agents
. We can use «class» and «id» for more than CSS.
The microformats of Dublin Core are simple and intuitive for web developers, search engines,…
In a web browser, we can «see»:
- Author of the Book
- Tim Berners-Lee
- Title
- Weawing the Web
- Publisher of the original version
- Harper Collins
- Publisher of spanish version
- Siglo XXI
The metadata (author, title, publisher,…) is accessible for the people and machines too (the machines only have to learn Dublin Core, and is easy 🙂
The microformats (of Dublin Core) are simply and easy. Only required know HTML, and Dublin Core. Of course, RDF is better, but with microformats the people and the machines can «enjoy» with the metadata.
I’m write about microformats of Dublin Core in my blog (Blog posible), and two articles in spanish web magazine: Microformatos Dublin Core and Etiquetas meta, ficheros RDF, microformatos: 3 sabores de la Web Semántica.
Excuse me for the extent of the post and for my bad english 🙂
This post is a trackback of Ockham’s Bathroom Scale, Lego™ blocks, and Microformats posted in Weibel Lines.
Technorati tags microformats, dublincore and semanticweb