[microformats-discuss] funness -> validator

[Tantek Ç elik]

On 8/16/05 11:59 AM, "Dr. Ernie Prabhakar" <drernie at opendarwin.org> wrote:

> On Aug 16, 2005, at 11:50 AM, Lucas Gonze wrote:
>> One thing I'm finding as I go along is that a validator would be
>> intensely useful, because you can (and have to) get pretty creative,
>> and it's hard to be sure that the results are still parseable.
> 
> That's something I wondered about.  Is there a rigorous grammar for
> what is and is not a valid microformat, such that someone -could-
> write a validator?

The short answer is no, we are still figuring it out.

> If not, are we deliberately keeping it vague?
> Has it not been needed yet?   Or have I just missed it?

The longer answer is yes, that we have XMDP which at least defines the
vocabulary of a microformat, and the remaining constraints are (MUST BE)
defined in the specifications.  As Brian noted, he's working on a generic
XMDP validator, but any validator for a particular format will need to have
hand coded rules for the specific format (just like *every* other format
validator out there, e.g. the HTML, CSS, RSS, Atom validators etc.).

Thanks,

Tantek