[uf-discuss] Format-of-Formats?

[Joe Reger, Jr.]

Hi All!

I've been lurking for a while and truly appreciate all of the great
work going into microformats right now!

I saw a message on the Structured Blogging mailing list that got me
thinking about a format-of-formats... a standard way to describe a
format.  My thoughts are here:

http://www.joereger.com/entry-logid7-eventid5003-Structured-Blogging-FormatofFormats.log

As I posted, I realized that I haven't checked in with Tantek and
others regarding the concept of a format-of-formats.  I've seen a lot
of Atom/RDF used.  I was a proponent of XML Schema a while back.  I've
been dabbling with Xforms.  XUL is out there.

My basic position is that we should be able to provide a common format
for the description of a microformat.  By creating a standard to
describe the formats we free toolmakers to create an implementation
and then be done with it.  Once we have support from WordPress, MT,
Drupal, LJ, etc then we can spawn microformats more quickly, requiring
little or no development on the toolmaker part.  Toolmakers will
compete by providing advanced features in their implementation (like
CSS override hooks, see blog post).  Aggregators like
Technorati/PubSub will be able to build advanced functionality on top
of specific formats and will compete at that level.  For example,
Technorati may create Technorati Music while PubSub may create PubSub
Movies... their investment differentiates and end-users win.

Is this format-of-formats already done?  If so, I apologize, can you
point me to it?  If not, what has been done and would it be premature
for me to start work on such a draft specification (after much
feedback from everybody here, of course)?

Thanks for getting me up to speed!  Keep up the great work!

Best,

Joe Reger