[microformats-discuss] Ambiguities in reltag specification

[Bud Gibson]

Hi Craig:

Please stick with text (not html) on the list.  Let me see if I can  
address some of these issues as I have wrestled with them recently:


>> How would spaces be supported in this case?   My assumption is  
>> through replacing spaces with "+", but this is not explicitly stated.
>>

Perhaps somewhat implicit in the spec is that you would use standard  
URL encoding practices.  It is after all a URL.


>> URLs are not the most convenient encoding for non-English languages
>>

And not always for English.  One of the motivations in the spec (per  
my very limited understanding) is that the tag point at a specific  
repository about items on that topic.  Making the tag be part of the  
URL helps guarantee this.

At the aggregator level, making the tag explicitly part of the URL  
also helps fight SPAM tagging since the tag is part of the pointer  
(see next).


>> Their is no guarantee that the apparent tag (the one displayed to  
>> the user) and the real tag are the same.  This defeats the peer  
>> pressure that is intended.
>>

The peer pressure comes at the aggregator level  Aggregators  
aggregate links based on the value in the URL not the link text.   
SPAM can then be reported if the tag is not accurate, and the  
perpetrating site is also immediately ID'd.  At individual sites, you  
are clearly in caveat emptor mode.


>> No guidance is given as to whether or not having different link  
>> text and tag value is considered bad form.
>>

For the most part, people make the two match.  The link text tends to  
be a readable form of the tag.  Having spoken with the spec authors,  
they indicate that not following this practice is also possible.  I'm  
not sure what the use case is though.


>> Have these things been addressed and are just not mentioned in the  
>> wiki or am I just not getting it?
>>

Have you looked at the technorati or IceRocket help pages for tags?

On Jul 21, 2005, at 16:02, Craig Ogg wrote:


> On reading the specification to things jump out as unclear.  Here  
> is a modified version of the example from the spec:
>
>      <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/tech" rel="tag">apple</a>
>
> According to the spec, the actual tag is determined by parsing the  
> URL. In the case it would be "tech" and not "apple."  This seems to  
> me to lead to several problems:
> Some tagging systems support spaces.  How would spaces be supported  
> in this case?   My assumption is through replacing spaces with "+",  
> but this is not explicitly stated.
> URLs are not the most convenient encoding for non-English languages
> Their is no guarantee that the apparent tag (the one displayed to  
> the user) and the real tag are the same.  This defeats the peer  
> pressure that is intended.
> No guidance is given as to whether or not having different link  
> text and tag value is considered bad form.
> Have these things been addressed and are just not mentioned in the  
> wiki or am I just not getting it?
>
> Craig
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