project-brainstorming

projecta

Even though there are existing project formats, the projecta format MUST be developed because there is no established project format and it will enable decentralized development of projects.

Contributors

• Derek Lewis

See Also

• project
• project-examples
• project-brainstorming
• project-formats

Format

In General

The projecta format is based on a set of fields common to numerous project sites and formats in use today on the web. Where possible field names have been chosen based on those defined by the related hCard, hCalendar, hReview, and hRecipe.

Schema

The projecta schema consists of the following:

• projecta (projecta)
  • version. optional. text.
  • summary. optional. text. serves as the title for the project.
  • type. optional. abstract | practical.
  • project info. required. fn (url || photo )
  • author. optional. hCard.
  • description. optional. text with optional valid HTML markup.
  • goals. optional. text with valid HTML ul (li) elements.
  • instructions. optional. text with valid HTML ol (li) elements.
  • accomplishments. optional. text with valid HTML ul (li) elements.
  • requirements. optional. text MAY include valid HTML markup e.g. paragraphs or a list.
  • tags. optional. keywords or phrases, using rel-tag, each with optional rating.
  • permalink. optional, using rel-bookmark and rel-self.

Field details

The fields of the projecta schema represent the following:

version:: This optional field permits projecta publishers to specify a particular version of projecta that their content uses. This field is syntax compatible with, and thus reuses the semantics of "VERSION" as defined in vCard RFC2426 section "3.6.9 VERSION Type Definition". The value of this field for this specification is "0.1".

summary:: This optional field serves as the title for the project.

type:: This optional field "type" provides the type of project, one of the following: abstract, practical. If omitted, then in some cases the project type may be inferred. For projects of type "abstract" SHOULD have "goals" and/or "accomplishments" fields completed. For projects of type "practical" SHOULD have "instructions" field completed.

project:: This required field MUST have at a minimum the name ("fn" - the formatted text corresponding to the name) of the project (a projecta describes only one project), MAY provide at least one URI ("url") for the project, and MAY provide at least one URL to a photo or depiction ("photo") of the project. However, when using item info subproperties ("fn", "url", "photo"), they MUST be nested inside the project element.

author:: This optional field specifies the person who authored the project. If the author is specified, an hCard representing the author MUST be provided.

description:: This optional field contains the full text representing the input of the author. The field MAY include valid HTML markup (e.g. paragraphs). User agents SHOULD preserve any markup.

goals:: This optional field documents the project's goals.

instructions:: This optional field documents the instructions required to complete the project. Re-used from hRecipe.

accomplishments:: This optional field documents the project's accomplishments.

requirements:: This optional field contains the requirements of the project. The field MAY include links to products or other projects.

tags:: Tags are represented using a list of keywords or phrases (using the rel-tag microformat for each individual keyword or phrase tag) that the author associates with the project.

permalink:: This optional field is a URL for the projecta. In addition to using the <a href> tag for this field, the attribute rel="self bookmark" MUST be used to indicate that the hyperlink is a permalink for the project itself. If the hyperlink already contains a rel attribute, then the values self and bookmark MUST be included among the space-separated set of values in the attribute. Indexers MAY treat the permalink of a project as a unique ID in order to identify and collate the same project from multiple sources (such as indexing a page multiple times). The permalink MAY also be used to indicate or imply the origin of the project. Authors MAY use the classname of "permalink" on the element representing the permalink.

The following field names have been reused from the hCard, hCalendar, hReview, and hRecipe microformats: version, summary, url, photo, description, instructions, tags, permalink. In addition, items and authors described by hCards MAY contain any hCard field. The rel value "self" has been reused from the Atom 1.0 specification.

Format Development

Further development is based on your feedback.

Project Type

There are two [types] of project page as I see it - the abstract (name of the project, description, goals, who's in charge, related web pages, etc) and the practical (name of the project, step by step how it can be achieved).

The former overlaps with hCard / hDOAP; the latter with hRecipe (though hRecipe only suitable for a limited subset). There is very little common ground.

The World Bank site and CORDIS are examples of the former - what are the goals of the project? who is taking part? who is funding it? how much will it cost? But they don't give you step-by-step instructions for how to carry out the project in your own home in your spare time. And you won't expect them to.

The knitting site, and recipes are different. The goals are not explicitly stated; no time frame is given (I could knit a poncho tomorrow, or maybe in a few years' time). The focus is on the step by step documentation of how it can be done, so that you can replicate the project yourself. -Toby

Suggestion

Rather than creating a large format that encompases both here's-how-you-can-do-it-at-home projects and here's-what-we're-doing projects, there is probably more value in creating two small formats, the former as perhaps an evolution of hRecipe and the latter as perhaps an extension to hCard.

hCard could be extended, for example, by defining goal, benefactor (containing an embedded hCard) and beneficiary (containing an embedded hCard) classes, and borrowing the due class from hCalendar.

<div class="vcard vproject">
  <h3 class="fn org">United Nations Giraffism Project</h3>
  <p class="goal">To cure the people of the world of giraffism,
        a terrible disease that gives people long necks,
        by <span class="due">2018</span>.</p>
  <p>Visit our <a href="http://giraffism.example.net/"
        class="url">website</a> for more details.</p>
</div>

Digestion

Added field named "type" (re-used from hReview) with options "abstract" and "practical".
Added field named "goals".
Added field named "instructions" (re-used from hRecipe).
Added field named "accomplishments".

See Also

• project
• project-examples
• project-brainstorming
• project-formats

See projecta for the result and evolution of these thoughts on a microformat.