[microformats-discuss] Evaulating RSS per the microformats principles.

[Ryan King]

On Aug 14, 2005, at 10:03 AM, Andreas Haugstrup wrote:
> On Sun, 14 Aug 2005 18:33:06 +0200, Michal Migurski  
> <mike at stamen.com> wrote:
>> So: I'm not arguing that RSS perfectly fits the bill, but I do  
>> wonder whether it fits the bill *well enough* to make a blog mf  
>> unnecessary for now. You point out that some participants in this  
>> thread do not themselves have blogs, which makes me think this is  
>> an academic desire not rooted in actual potential use.
>
> But RSS is a subscription format, but an archive format. It's nice  
> if I'm only interested in the latest 10 entries, but apart from  
> that it's useless. HTML *is* in wide use - everyone uses it for  
> their archives.
>
> I can tell how I use a meta data profile for my blog. I started to  
> create a profile for blogs last December. In the past 8 months I've  
> made one revision, and I want to do some major revisions, but I  
> thought I'd lurk on this list a bit before I jump in and change my  
> blog around again.

This is awesome.

> I've been taking a long break from this idea to do other stuff.  
> Lately I've become interested again because Technorati reliably  
> marks my entries with the *wrong* title (it's one off). With a blog  
> MF Technorati might get my titles right. :o)

:)

> XHTML is my archive format. I don't save my blog entries in a  
> database. They're saved as XHTML pages I parse as I need to. The  
> decision to set up my blog like that was half idealistic  
> experiment, half realities (I don't have SQL on that hosting  
> account). Overall it's been treating me nice - it's not giving me  
> any trouble fetching the data I need.
>
> My blog is at <URL: http://www.solitude.dk/ >
> The profile document is at <URL: http://www.solitude.dk/blogprofile/ 
> 011/ >
>
> My expiriences:
>
>  - The invisible <meta> data should go. I'm not using it, and I  
> can't really see what others would use it for. Author, copyright,  
> description should be changed to being visible metadata. Then my  
> readers can use it.
>
>  - I use class="entry" for my entries, and the title is the only  
> <h1> inside "entry".
>
>  - I use <p class="datestamp"> for the time. I'd like to change  
> that to use the <abbr> way of expressing times. That way machines  
> can read my dates as well as my readers.
>
>  - I use rel="permalink" for my permalinks. I know some blog  
> engines use rel="bookmark", but it doesn't feel right to me. As far  
> as I can tell rel="bookmark" is meant for single documents, not  
> multiple resources.
>
>  - I use rel="cite" for links to citations. I have been pondering  
> whether I should change this to <cite><a></a></cite>. So far I've  
> opted against because I use the reverse relationship (rev="cite")  
> to mark links to trackbacks and pingbacks.
>
>  - The rel="enclosure" needs to be more detailed. With bloggers  
> using Yahoo's Media RSS the same kind of enclosure structure should  
> be available in the HTML. There needs to be a way to describe  
> enclosure groups (multiple versions of the same enclosure).
>
>  - I'm worried about citations (whether it's rel="cite" or <cite>)  
> and enclosures. Changes are needed in the blogging engines for  
> these to work. Their UI needs to handle this for the writer. Right  
> now Wordpress generates enclosures for almost anything making the  
> whole thing very painful. I can't link to a video file without it  
> being added as an enclosure. That's a very uncool way to handle  
> things (a link does not in itself imply that the video is a part of  
> the entry).
>
>  - I use the enclosure and citation data on my archives. Under each  
> entry the enclosures and citations are listed. E.g. <URL: http:// 
> www.solitude.dk/archives/2005_08.php >


This is all very cool work. Great analysis.

-ryan