Subject: RE: To RDF or not to RDF, that is the (perennial) question

From: "Mark Birbeck" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 6 Jan 2005 17:50:56 -0000

Antone,

> 4) Atom uses RDF, but the way documents are structured is constrained 
> to a subset of how RDF can be structured so that it doesn't require 
> RDF-aware tools to process, and the amount of overhead added 
> by the RDF 
> syntax is minimal.  This should be at least minimally acceptable to 
> pretty much everyone.

I've been meaning to post the following link to this list for a while, but
have been "just too busy", as they say:

  <http://www.formsPlayer.com/notes/rdf-a.html>

Anyway, just briefly, it is a proposal for new syntax for RDF. It's come out
of the work I've been doing as an Invited Expert on the HTML Working Group,
where we have restructured the metadata 'story' for HTML for XHTML 2. This
syntax is actually going to be part of XHTML 2.

It has been reviewed and quite well received by the RDF community, and I
think it is pretty much your option 4. It is discussed on this list:

  <http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-rdf-in-xhtml-tf/>

I do have a number of comments on how I think it could work for Atom,
although I'm afraid I'll have to leave those for another time. I just
thought it worth bringing this document to your attention at least, to show
that there is some momentum for an easier RDF syntax. (Although those not
familiar with RDF may still find the actual specification a little tricky --
but the actual resulting mark-up is not.)

Regards,

Mark

Mark Birbeck
CEO
x-port.net Ltd.

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