[uf-discuss] Standardised list of plural properties

[Tantek Ç elik]

On 11/4/05 9:39 AM, "David House" <dmhouse at gmail.com> wrote:

> Pertaining to hCal/hCard (and I guess hReview as well, although I
> haven't poked around there).
> 
> 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.
> 
> Example: for hCard, I've come up with this list by looking throught
> the examples and by using common sense:
> 
> honorific-prefix
> honorific-suffix
> email
> tel
> additional-name
> nickname
> organisation-unit
> category
> (type -- bit of a special case as it's not technically a property)

Hi David,

Thanks for the question.  I think this is important to clarify for both
hCard authors and parsers.


First, type is effectively a sub-property of several properties.

Second, I have avoided *duplicating* (or providing a shortcut for) the "can
this property occur multiple times or not" deliberately in order to avoid
repeating a constraint from RFC 2426 vCard, and thus potentially getting it
wrong.

Here is the way to determine whether or not a particular property can occur
multiple times (is a plural property / may have multiple instances or
values).

1. Check the hCard XMDP profile for the property definition:

 http://microformats.org/wiki/hcard-profile

2. If the property definition references a plural form in RFC 2426 (e.g.
honorific-suffix references honorific suffixes), then the property is a
plural property.

3. Else go check the referenced section in RFC 2426 which should state
explicitly whether or not the property is plural or singular.

4. Else (if RFC 2426 is *not* explicit) then the property is plural.


This feels like an FAQ question so I will add it to the hCard FAQ.

 http://microformats.org/wiki/hcard-faq

Thanks,

Tantek