[uf-discuss] Standardised list of plural properties

[Tantek Ç elik]

On 11/4/05 10:43 AM, "Scott Reynen" <scott at randomchaos.com> wrote:

> David House wrote:
> 
>> Is there a list of all properties which can be plural anywhere? If
>> not, could there be? It would be useful as these have to be treated
>> differently when parsing.
> 
> Wouldn't it be simpler to parse under the assumption that any
> property could potentially be plural and ignore all but the first
> instance as makes sense in a given context?  I suspect predefining
> these within formats will unnecessarily restrict use in rare
> instances that could not all be considered in advance.  For example,
> we might assume birthday is a singular property, but some cultures
> celebrate multiple birthdays (e.g. lunar vs. Gregorian calendar).
> Making such assumptions could easily make formats less useful.

If we were starting from scratch then yes, you are correct that we would not
want to make such assumptions.

But we are not starting from scratch, hCard is modeling the vCard schema
(including restrictions) in XHTML, and thus hCard inherits all such
restrictions from vCard, unless we have a *very* good reason to make an
exception (and there are some), and in that case they are very carefully
documented in the hCard specification.

Thanks,

Tantek