rel-registry

<entry-title>rel registry</entry-title>

The microformats wiki has the closest thing to a real-world rel value registry. We have the most comprehensive documentation of existing-rel-values currently which performs quite well as a rel registry, perhaps even better than any other "official" attempts at rel registries out there.

stable rel values

The formats section of the existing-rel-values page can be used as a list of stable/dependable rel values.

draft rel values

The proposals section of the existing-rel-values page can be used as a list of rel values with reasonably well written proposals.

provisional rel values

The brainstorming section of the existing-rel-values page can be used as a list of ideas / simple proposals for rel values that merit further research and development (and possibly documentation as drafts) per the microformats process

additional rel values

The existing-rel-values page contains additional sections/clusterings of rel values that have been documented in the wild. Some of these may merit brainstorming/provisional registration and further development.

There is also documentation of dropped and rejected rel values for the sake of thoroughness and to hopefully avoid having them be unnecessarily re-proposed (without at least following up on why they failed in the first place.)

new rel values

If you wish to develop a new rel value, please follow the microformats process. Feel free to add possible rel values to the brainstorms section, but be sure to follow-up quickly with a page for the rel value itself explaining it in more detail, as well as email the microformats-new mailing-list.

FAQ

Does the microformats rel registry reflect reality

Q: Does the microformats rel registry reflect reality?

A: In practice yes. The list of existing-rel-values very carefully documents which rel values are in well-accepted standards (formats), which have well written microformats drafts (proposals), and which others are in development, sometimes on other sites (brainstorming).

In addition, the microformats existing-rel-values reflects reality better than any other attempt at a registry, because it also explicitly documents which rel values have failed in the real world, or have otherwise been obsoleted or rejected.

Finally, the barrier to entry for adding to and correcting the existing-rel-values is the lowest of any existing registry and thus the microformats community has best track record of keeping it up to date as compared to other attempts at registries.

Can the microformats rel registry document HTML specific details

Q: Can the microformats rel registry document HTML-specific details?

A: Currently the existing-rel-values are documented in a format-agnostic manner, though in practice most of the real world usage of existing rel values is in HTML.

If there are specific real-world documented needs for capturing HTML-specific details, the existing-rel-values tables could be expanded with a column to describe those HTML-specific details.

Can the microformats rel registry be used for provisional registration

Q: Can the microformats rel registry be used for provisionally registering new rel values?

A: Yes. See the provisional rel values section.

How do provisional values achieve full registration

Q: How do provisionally registered values achieve full registration?

The microformats process documents a number of steps to advance any microformats effort, including new rel values. In short, documenting specific real world use cases for a new rel value, and research into existing content that could benefit from it, as well as earlier/other attempts at such concepts help greatly.

Also the microformats process has been updated this year (2011) to provide a more explicit path from draft, to specification, to standard. Those take additional steps such as documenting real world uses of the provision rel value, implementations, test suites, test results.