Microformats: Empowering Your Markup for Web 2.0

Microformats: Empowering Your Markup for Web 2.0

by John Allsopp
Released March 2007
Publisher(s): Apress
ISBN: 9781590598146

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Book description

Microformats burst onto the scene a couple of years ago and are fast becoming an essential tool for all professional web designers and developers. Imagine being able to integrate all of your web-based contact details, tagged articles, and geographical information seamlessly in web and desktop applications, without having to add anything extra to your websites except a little specialized HTML markup.

Microformats provide a more formalized technology for adding commonly used semantics (such as contact details, location, and reviews) to today's Web. Unlike XML or the semantic Web, microformats use ubiquitous technologies like HTML and XHTML, existing developer skills, and current web tools, and, perhaps most important, they work in all of today's web browsers.

This book is a comprehensive guide to microformats. It explores why—in Bill Gates' words—"We need microformats," how microformats work, and the kinds of problems microformats help solve. The book covers every current microformat, with complete details of the syntax, semantics, and uses of each, along with real-world examples and a comprehensive survey of the tools available for working with them. the book also features case studies detailing how major web content publishers such as yahoo put microformats to work in their web applications.

Written by one of the Web's best-known educators, John Allsopp, Microformats: Empowering Your Markup for Web 2.0 will help you painlessly get up to speed with this exciting technology.

Table of contents

  1. Title Page
  2. Dedication
  3. CONTENTS AT A GLANCE
  4. CONTENTS
  5. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
  6. ABOUT THE TECHNICAL REVIEWER
  7. INTRODUCTION
    1. Layout conventions
  8. PART ONE INTRODUCING MICROFORMATS
    1. 1 WHAT ARE MICROFORMATS?
      1. Too much (disparate) information
      2. Microformats overview
      3. Benefits of microformats
      4. Summary
    2. 2 THE STATE OF THE ART IN MICROFORMATS
      1. The future of browsers
      2. Tools to help publish microformatted content
      3. Publishers using microformats
      4. Services using microformats
      5. Summary
  9. PART TWO USING MICROFORMATS
    1. 3 STRUCTURAL AND SEMANTIC HTML
      1. The bad old days of HTML
      2. Document structure
      3. The limits of HTML: Why we need microformats
      4. Summary
    2. 4 LINK-BASED MICROFORMATS: REL-LICENSE, REL-TAG, REL-NOFOLLOW, AND VOTELINKS
      1. The rel and rev attributes
      2. The rel-license microformat
      3. The rel-tag microformat
      4. The rel-nofollow and VoteLinks microformats
      5. Summary
    3. 5 MICROFORMAT TO DESCRIBE RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN PEOPLE: XFN
      1. XFN overview
      2. XFN relationships
      3. XFN in action
      4. Styling XFN content with CSS
      5. Summary
    4. 6 LOCATION MICROFORMATS: GEO AND ADR
      1. Location microformats overview
      2. The geo microformat
      3. The adr microformat
      4. Summary
    5. 7 CONTACT INFORMATION MICROFORMAT: HCARD
      1. hCard overview
      2. Using hCard
      3. Tools for working with hCard
      4. Services publishing with hCard
      5. Styling hCard content with CSS
      6. Summary
    6. 8 EVENT MICROFORMAT: HCALENDAR
      1. hCalendar overview
      2. Using hCalendar
      3. hCalendar and tables
      4. Tools for authoring hCalendars
      5. Benefits of using hCalendar
      6. Publishers using hCalendar
      7. Summary
    7. 9 REVIEW AND RESUME MICROFORMATS: HREVIEW AND HRESUME
      1. hReview
      2. hResume
      3. Styling hReview and hResume content with CSS
      4. Summary
    8. 10 SYNDICATED CONTENT MICROFORMAT: HATOM
      1. Web-based subscription services
      2. hAtom overview
      3. Using hAtom
      4. Services using hAtom
      5. Summary
  10. PART THREE CASE STUDIES
    1. 11 CASE STUDY: CORK'D
      1. Introducing Dan Cederholm
      2. Introducing Cork'd
      3. Summary
    2. 12 CASE STUDY: YAHOO
      1. Introducing Nate Koechley
      2. Upcoming
      3. Reviews at Yahoo Local
      4. hReviews at Yahoo Tech
      5. Is it worth it?
      6. Summary
  11. PART FOUR DEVELOPING MICROFORMATS
    1. 13 THE PROCESS OF DEVELOPING MICROFORMATS
      1. Microformat principles revisited
      2. Determining the problem
      3. Researching (or "paving the cowpaths")
      4. Documenting the process
      5. Developing a draft schema
      6. Summary
  12. PART FIVE APPENDIXES
    1. APPENDIX A MICROFORMAT SPECIFICATION REFERENCE
      1. rel-license
      2. rel-tag
      3. rel-nofollow
      4. VoteLinks
      5. XHTML Friends Network (XFN)
      6. geo
      7. adr
      8. hCard
      9. hCalendar
      10. hReview
      11. hResume
      12. hAtom
    2. APPENDIX B MICROFORMAT DESIGN PATTERNS
      1. The abbr design pattern
      2. The class design pattern
      3. The datetime design pattern
      4. The include pattern
      5. The rel design pattern
      6. Attribute conventions
    3. APPENDIX C PEOPLE, TOOLS, SERVICES, AND PUBLISHERS
      1. People
      2. Tools
      3. Services
      4. Publishers
      5. Related organizations
  13. Index

Product information

  • Title: Microformats: Empowering Your Markup for Web 2.0
  • Author(s): John Allsopp
  • Release date: March 2007
  • Publisher(s): Apress
  • ISBN: 9781590598146