task

Tasks - Compound Microformat

Initial draft

This wiki page outlines the overall effort to develop a task microformat. We intend to document current examples of [1] on the web today, their implicit/explicit schemas, and current cite/citation formats, with the intent of deriving a cite microformat from that research.

Authors

Walter Stevenson

Copyright

This specification is (C) 2004-2024 by the authors. However, the authors intend to submit (or already have submitted, see details in the spec) this specification to a standards body with a liberal copyright/licensing policy such as the GMPG, IETF, and/or W3C. Anyone wishing to contribute should read their copyright principles, policies and licenses (e.g. the GMPG Principles) and agree to them, including licensing of all contributions under all required licenses (e.g. CC-by 1.0 and later), before contributing.

• Walter Stevenson: I release all my contributions to this specification into the public domain and I encourage the other authors to do so as well.
  • When all authors/editors have done so, we can remove the MicroFormatCopyrightStatement template reference and replace it with the MicroFormatPublicDomainContributionStatement.

Semantic XHTML Design Principles

Note: the Semantic XHTML Design Principles were written primarily within the context of developing hCard and hCalendar, thus it may be easier to understand these principles in the context of the hCard design methodology (i.e. read that first). Tantek

XHTML is built on XML, and thus XHTML based formats can be used not only for convenient display presentation, but also for general purpose data exchange. In many ways, XHTML based formats exemplify the best of both HTML and XML worlds. However, when building XHTML based formats, it helps to have a guiding set of principles.

1. Reuse the schema (names, objects, properties, values, types, hierarchies, constraints) as much as possible from pre-existing, established, well-supported standards by reference. Avoid restating constraints expressed in the source standard. Informative mentions are ok.
   1. For types with multiple components, use nested elements with class names equivalent to the names of the components.
   2. Plural components are made singular, and thus multiple nested elements are used to represent multiple text values that are comma-delimited.
2. Use the most accurately precise semantic XHTML building block for each object etc.
3. Otherwise use a generic structural element (e.g. <span> or <div>), or the appropriate contextual element (e.g. an <li> inside a <ul> or <ol>).
4. Use class names based on names from the original schema, unless the semantic XHTML building block precisely represents that part of the original schema. If names in the source schema are case-insensitive, then use an all lowercase equivalent. Components names implicit in prose (rather than explicit in the defined schema) should also use lowercase equivalents for ease of use. Spaces in component names become dash '-' characters.
5. Finally, if the format of the data according to the original schema is too long and/or not human-friendly, use <abbr> instead of a generic structural element, and place the literal data into the 'title' attribute (where abbr expansions go), and the more brief and human readable equivalent into the element itself. Further informative explanation of this use of <abbr>: Human vs. ISO8601 dates problem solved

Purpose

The Problem: Currently there is no extensible hypertext format for creating, exporting, and sharing project TASKS. Tasks and ToDo items are typically handled by proprietary desktop software clients like mail programs and calendar applications that are not:

• open to the web development community
• extensible for future usage scenarios
• interoperable between applications
• portable between systems
• accessible for persons with disabilities

Participants

• Walter Stevenson

Examples

The following examples demonstrate the ways in which people currently assign tasks, on- and off-line:

Web Based Task Management

• BaseCamp ToDos
• Remember the Milk Beta
• Sourceforge TaskCoach
• Microsoft Outlook Tasks and SharePoint
• Trimpath ToDo Manager
• TaskFreak Task Manager
• GotoCode Task Manager

Desktop Task Management

• Microsoft Project
• Mac Mail ToDos
• Mozilla Thunderbird Calendaring Extension: Lightning
• The Omni Group OmniPlan

Vision

To create a fully-functional Task Microformat for 1) open use in home-grown clients, widgets and applications and 2) adopted for integration with existing software applications such as Microsoft Outlook, Mozilla Thunderbird, Mac Mail, and other popular programs.

Previous Formats

The Task Microformat may be based loosely on elements found in the VTODO spec. VTODO is part of the RFC2445 iCalendar spec used for describing task items. VTODO is fairly straight-forward, as it doesn't contain any nested entities, and has a fairly small list of properties. Most of these it shares with VEVENT, suggesting a Task Microformat be modeled on hevent in hcalendar, and the ground assumption is that htodo should work just like hevent with respect to these properties. The shared properties in this case might include:

class, created, description, dtstamp, dtstart, geo, last-mod, location, organizer, priority, recurid, seq, statusm summary, uid, url, duration, attach, attendee, categories, comment, contact, exdate, exrule, rstatus, related, resources, rdate, rrule, x-prop

The unique properties of the existing VTODO format are:

• completed The date/time the todo was completed
• due The date/time this todo is due
• percent Integer from 0-100, completion status

As the data types for completed and due are the same as, e.g., dtstart, then the usage should be the same. For example,

<abbr class="due" title="2007-01-01T13:10:05.0Z">January 1, 2007</abbr>

Model Implementation (Code Snippet)

<form id="form1" name="form1" method="post" action=""> 
			<h2> Assign Task</h2> 
		  <p> 
			<label> <strong> Title:</strong>  
					<input type="text" name="textfield" /> 
			</label> 
		  </p> 
			<p> 
				<label class="priority"> <strong> Priority:</strong> 
					<select name="select7"> 
						<option value="Low"> Low</option> 
						<option value="Medium" selected="selected"> Medium</option> 
						<option value="High"> High</option> 
					</select> 
				</label> 
		  </p> 
			<p> 
				<label class="dtend"> <strong> Due date:</strong>  
					<br /> 
					<input name="radiobutton" type="radio" value="radiobutton" checked="checked" /> 
					<select name="select"> 
						<option value="January" selected> January</option> 
						<option value="February"> February</option> 
						<option value="March"> March</option> 
						<option value="April"> April</option> 
						<option value="May"> May</option> 
						<option value="June"> June</option> 
						<option value="July"> July</option> 
						<option value="August"> August</option> 
						<option value="September"> September</option> 
						<option value="October"> October</option> 
						<option value="November"> November</option> 
						<option value="December"> December</option> 
					</select> 
				</label> 
				<label> 
					<select name="select2"> 
						<option value="01"> 01</option> 
						<option value="02"> 02</option> 
						<option value="03"> 03</option> 
						<option value="04"> 04</option> 
						<option value="05"> 05</option> 
						<option value="06"> 06</option> 
						<option value="07"> 07</option> 
						<option value="08"> 08</option> 
						<option value="09"> 09</option> 
						<option value="10"> 10</option> 
						<option value="11"> 11</option> 
						<option value="12"> 12</option> 
						<option value="13"> 13</option> 
						<option value="14"> 14</option> 
						<option value="15"> 15</option> 
						<option value="16"> 16</option> 
						<option value="17"> 17</option> 
						<option value="18"> 18</option> 
						<option value="19"> 19</option> 
						<option value="20"> 20</option> 
						<option value="21"> 21</option> 
						<option value="22"> 22</option> 
						<option value="23"> 23</option> 
						<option value="24"> 24</option> 
						<option value="25"> 25</option> 
						<option value="26"> 26</option> 
						<option value="27"> 27</option> 
						<option value="28"> 28</option> 
						<option value="29"> 29</option> 
						<option value="30"> 30</option> 
						<option value="31"> 31</option> 
					</select> 
				</label> 
				<label> 
					<select name="select3"> 
						<option value="2007"> 2007</option> 
						<option value="2008"> 2008</option> 
						<option value="2009"> 2009</option> 
						<option value="2010"> 2010</option> 
					</select> 
				</label> 
			</p> 
			<p> 
				<label class="rrule"> 
					<input name="radiobutton" type="radio" value="radiobutton" /> 
					Recurs: 
				</label> 
				<label class="freq"> 
					<select name="select9"> 
						<option value="Daily" selected="selected"> Daily</option> 
						<option value="Weekly"> Weekly</option> 
						<option value="Monthly"> Monthly</option> 
						<option value="Annually"> Annually</option> 
					</select> 
				</label> 
				<label> At:  
					<select name="select10"> 
					  <option value="Early morning"> Before 7AM</option> 
					  <option value="7:00 AM"> 7:00 AM</option> 
					  <option value="8:00 AM"> 8:00 AM</option> 
					  <option value="9:00 AM" selected> 9:00 AM</option> 
					  <option value="10:00 AM"> 10:00 AM</option> 
					  <option value="11:00 AM"> 11:00 AM</option> 
					  <option value="12:00 PM"> 12:00 PM</option> 
					  <option value="1:00 PM"> 1:00 PM</option> 
					  <option value="2:00 PM"> 2:00 PM</option> 
					  <option value="3:00 PM"> 3:00 PM</option> 
					  <option value="4:00 PM"> 4:00 PM</option> 
					  <option value="5:00 PM"> 5:00 PM</option> 
					  <option value="6:00 PM"> 6:00 PM</option> 
					  <option value="7:00 PM"> 7:00 PM</option> 
					  <option value="Late night"> After 7PM</option> 
					</select> 
				</label> 
			</p> 
			<p> 
				<label> <strong> Start date:</strong>  
					<input name="radiobutton" type="radio" value="radiobutton" checked="checked" /> Today
					<input name="radiobutton" type="radio" value="radiobutton" /> 
					<span class="dtend"> 
					<select name="select11"> 
                      <option value="January" selected> January</option> 
                      <option value="February"> February</option> 
                      <option value="March"> March</option> 
                      <option value="April"> April</option> 
                      <option value="May"> May</option> 
                      <option value="June"> June</option> 
                      <option value="July"> July</option> 
                      <option value="August"> August</option> 
                      <option value="September"> September</option> 
                      <option value="October"> October</option> 
                      <option value="November"> November</option> 
                      <option value="December"> December</option> 
                                                            </select> 
					</span> 
					<select name="select13"> 
                      <option value="01"> 01</option> 
                      <option value="02"> 02</option> 
                      <option value="03"> 03</option> 
                      <option value="04"> 04</option> 
                      <option value="05"> 05</option> 
                      <option value="06"> 06</option> 
                      <option value="07"> 07</option> 
                      <option value="08"> 08</option> 
                      <option value="09"> 09</option> 
                      <option value="10"> 10</option> 
                      <option value="11"> 11</option> 
                      <option value="12"> 12</option> 
                      <option value="13"> 13</option> 
                      <option value="14"> 14</option> 
                      <option value="15"> 15</option> 
                      <option value="16"> 16</option> 
                      <option value="17"> 17</option> 
                      <option value="18"> 18</option> 
                      <option value="19"> 19</option> 
                      <option value="20"> 20</option> 
                      <option value="21"> 21</option> 
                      <option value="22"> 22</option> 
                      <option value="23"> 23</option> 
                      <option value="24"> 24</option> 
                      <option value="25"> 25</option> 
                      <option value="26"> 26</option> 
                      <option value="27"> 27</option> 
                      <option value="28"> 28</option> 
                      <option value="29"> 29</option> 
                      <option value="30"> 30</option> 
                      <option value="31"> 31</option> 
                    </select> 
					<select name="select4"> 
                      <option value="2007"> 2007</option> 
                      <option value="2008"> 2008</option> 
                      <option value="2009"> 2009</option> 
                      <option value="2010"> 2010</option> 
                    </select> 
			  </label> 
			</p> 
			<p> 
				<label class="dtrem"> 
					<input type="checkbox" name="checkbox" value="checkbox" /> 
					<strong> Alarm:</strong> 
					<select name="select12"> 
                      <option value="January" selected> January</option> 
                      <option value="February"> February</option> 
                      <option value="March"> March</option> 
                      <option value="April"> April</option> 
                      <option value="May"> May</option> 
                      <option value="June"> June</option> 
                      <option value="July"> July</option> 
                      <option value="August"> August</option> 
                      <option value="September"> September</option> 
                      <option value="October"> October</option> 
                      <option value="November"> November</option> 
                      <option value="December"> December</option> 
                    </select> 
					<select name="select14"> 
                      <option value="01"> 01</option> 
                      <option value="02"> 02</option> 
                      <option value="03"> 03</option> 
                      <option value="04"> 04</option> 
                      <option value="05"> 05</option> 
                      <option value="06"> 06</option> 
                      <option value="07"> 07</option> 
                      <option value="08"> 08</option> 
                      <option value="09"> 09</option> 
                      <option value="10"> 10</option> 
                      <option value="11"> 11</option> 
                      <option value="12"> 12</option> 
                      <option value="13"> 13</option> 
                      <option value="14"> 14</option> 
                      <option value="15"> 15</option> 
                      <option value="16"> 16</option> 
                      <option value="17"> 17</option> 
                      <option value="18"> 18</option> 
                      <option value="19"> 19</option> 
                      <option value="20"> 20</option> 
                      <option value="21"> 21</option> 
                      <option value="22"> 22</option> 
                      <option value="23"> 23</option> 
                      <option value="24"> 24</option> 
                      <option value="25"> 25</option> 
                      <option value="26"> 26</option> 
                      <option value="27"> 27</option> 
                      <option value="28"> 28</option> 
                      <option value="29"> 29</option> 
                      <option value="30"> 30</option> 
                      <option value="31"> 31</option> 
                    </select> 
					<select name="select5"> 
                      <option value="2007"> 2007</option> 
                      <option value="2008"> 2008</option> 
                      <option value="2009"> 2009</option> 
                      <option value="2010"> 2010</option> 
                    </select> 
					<select name="select6"> 
                      <option value="Early morning"> Before 7AM</option> 
                      <option value="7:00 AM"> 7:00 AM</option> 
                      <option value="8:00 AM"> 8:00 AM</option> 
                      <option value="9:00 AM" selected> 9:00 AM</option> 
                      <option value="10:00 AM"> 10:00 AM</option> 
                      <option value="11:00 AM"> 11:00 AM</option> 
                      <option value="12:00 PM"> 12:00 PM</option> 
                      <option value="1:00 PM"> 1:00 PM</option> 
                      <option value="2:00 PM"> 2:00 PM</option> 
                      <option value="3:00 PM"> 3:00 PM</option> 
                      <option value="4:00 PM"> 4:00 PM</option> 
                      <option value="5:00 PM"> 5:00 PM</option> 
                      <option value="6:00 PM"> 6:00 PM</option> 
                      <option value="7:00 PM"> 7:00 PM</option> 
                      <option value="Late night"> After 7PM</option> 
                    </select> 
			  </label> 
			</p> 
			<p> 
				<label class="fn"> <strong> Assigned to:</strong> 
					<input type="text" name="textfield2" /> 
				</label>  
			</p> 
			<p> 
				<label class="cc"> <strong> Send a copy to:</strong>  
					<input type="text" name="textfield22" /> 
				</label> 
			</p> 
		  <p> 
			<label class="enclosure"> <strong> Associate a file URI:</strong> 
			<input type="text" name="textfield222" /> 
			</label> 
			<label rel="enclosure"> </label> 
		  </p> 
			<p> 
			<label class="summary"> <strong> Summary:</strong>  
			<textarea name="textarea"> </textarea> 
			</label> 
			</p> 
			<p> 
			<input type="submit" name="Submit3" value="Save and Close" /> 
			</p> 
			<hr  /> 
			<h3> Advanced Options:</h3> 
			<p>  
			<label class="status"> <strong> Status:</strong> 
				<select name="select8"> 
					<option value="Active" selected="selected"> Active</option> 
					<option value="Disabled"> Disabled</option> 
					<option value="Complete"> Complete</option> 
				</select> 
			</label> 
			</p> 
			<p> 
				<label class="privacy"> <strong> Privacy:</strong>  
					<input name="radiobutton" type="radio" value="radiobutton" checked="checked" />  Public</label> 
				<label class="privacy"> 
					<input name="radiobutton" type="radio" value="radiobutton" />  Private
				</label> 
			</p> 
			<p> 
				<label class="category"> <strong> Category:</strong> 
					<input type="text" name="textfield3" /> 
				</label> 
			</p> 
			<p> 
				<label rel="meta"> <strong> Tags:</strong> 
					<input type="text" name="textfield4" /> 
				</label> 
			</p> 
			<p> 
				<label rel="org"> <strong> Group / Team :</strong> 
					<input type="text" name="textfield32" /> 
				</label> 
			</p> 
			<p> 
				<label rel="par"> <strong> Parent Task URI:</strong> 
				  <input type="text" name="textfield6" /> 
				</label> 
			</p> 
			<p> 
				<label rel="dep"> <strong> Dependency Task (Critical Path) URI:</strong> 
					<input type="text" name="textfield7" /> 
				</label> 
			</p> 
			<p> 
				<input type="submit" name="Submit32" value="Save and Close" /> 
				<!-- Submit button must dynamically assign orignator, timezone, creation date, duration, 0% progress, etc. --> 
			<br /> 
			</p> 
		</form> 

See Also / Next Steps

To see the rendered output of the code above or to collaborate on the draft proposal, go to: activemechanics.com/resources/hTask