[microformats-discuss] XHTML tables as CSV-like "records"?

[Mark Rickerby]

> b) What differentiates a microformat from a design pattern from an
> HTML compound?

Hi...

The relationship of microformats and compounds to design patterns, is
that they exist to solve a specific problem in a way that is reusable.
For me, the key distinction is that microformats are community
mediated standards that can be applied in a general context, wheras
compounds are fixed blocks of structure that are applied in a specific
context. Both are reusable, but microformats are explicitly linked to
a profile, wheras compounds merely exist in context (eg: a citation
might exist in the context of a blog entry).

I just wrote something aimed at answering exactly this question, and
hopefully dispelling some of the mistaken assumptions that have been
coming up recently, regarding class attributes being the only way to
express meaning:

http://maetl.coretxt.net.nz/?m=xhtml-design-patterns

It's a work in progress, there is obviously a lot missing, which I
will hopefully fill in over the coming weeks as I learn more...

AFAIK, the class=xoxo attribute is not required, for lists to be xoxo
compatible. I didn't write this down, but was wondering if as well as
being an elementary microformat, perhaps xoxo is the archetypal
example of a semantic XHTML compound as well?

Regards,
Mark