[uf-discuss] Microformats research

[Jesse Rodgers]

Hi,

A little while ago I posted a version of my Masters research paper on
Microformats in Higher Education:

http://whoyoucallingajesse.com/past/2008/7/16/a_look_at_microformats_for/

One thing I didn't cover in my research was a set of use cases. My
goal was to try and establish/apply a decent way to assess content and
try and identify any unique patterns. I only looked at home pages in
the interest of getting it done but there is a lot more research that
could be done if anyone was so inclined and/or found it useful.

>From the experience I learned a few things:

- the microformats wiki creates a problem for academic papers - wiki
content (arguably most web based content that isn't a published paper)
needs to be copy/pasted into an appendix, the wiki doesn't make that
easy. I had to reformat a lot of text in MS Word...
- John Allsopp's book and a handful of articles was all I could find
that was directly related and published -- John's book made life
easier ;)
- most microformats 'research' (at the time) explained what they are
not looking at how they may be really useful - that requires someone
figures out a way to assess 'value' I think
- academic research can be fun, the process not so much

I thought some folks might find the bibliography useful at the very
least... I did finally post some use cases for higher education as
well:

http://whoyoucallingajesse.com/past/2008/8/14/how_can_microformats_help_higher/

...and I still think course information (found in what is called a
course calendar or catalogue) needs its own format. But that is a
discussion for another time...

Jesse