The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) develops interoperable technologies (specifications, guidelines, software, and tools) to lead the Web to its full potential. W3C is a forum for information, commerce, communication, and collective understanding. On this page, you'll find W3C news, links to W3C technologies and ways to get involved. New visitors can find help in Finding Your Way at W3C. We encourage organizations to learn more about W3C and about W3C Membership.
W3C would like to thank Nokia, Platinum Sponsor of W3C's TPAC 2008, 20-24 October in Mandelieu, France.
To celebrate ten years of XML, W3C invites you to send a greeting and tell us about an XML-related blog or article. Many thanks to the FLWOR Foundation for their generous sponsorship of XML10.
Help W3C by making a donation through the W3C Supporters Program.
Current job opportunities at W3C: Training and Mobile Web Specialist. Current W3C Fellows Program openings are Business and Technology Communications Specialist; Software Engineer.
2008-10-14: W3C published today a standard that will simplify the development of Web applications that speak and listen to users. The Pronunciation Lexicon Specification (PLS) 1.0 is the newest piece of W3C's Speech Interface Framework for creating Web applications driven by voice and speech. PLS can reduce the cost of developing these applications by allowing people to share and reuse pronunciation dictionaries. "There are 10 times as many phones in the world as connected PCs. Phones will become the major portal to the Web," said James A. Larson, co-Chair of the Voice Browser Working Group, which produced the new standard. Read the press release and testimonials, and learn more about the W3C Voice Browser Activity. (Permalink)
2008-10-15: The Semantic Web Deployment Working Group and the XHTML2 Working Group published the W3C Recommendation RDFa in XHTML: Syntax and Processing. This specification allows publishers to express structured data on the Web within XHTML. This allows tools to read it, enabling a new world of user functionality, allowing users to transfer structured data between applications and web sites, and allowing browsing applications to improve the user experience. For those looking for an introduction to the use of RDFa and some real-world examples, please consult the updated RDFa Primer. Learn more about the Semantic Web Activity and the HTML Activity. (Permalink)
2008-10-15: Participants from four W3C Groups CSS, Internationalization Core, SVG and XSL Working Groups as part of the Japanese Layout Task Force published an update of Requirements of Japanese Text Layout. This document describes requirements for general Japanese layout realized with technologies like CSS, SVG and XSL-FO. The document is mainly based on a standard for Japanese layout, JIS X 4051. However, it also addresses areas which are not covered by JIS X 4051. This draft contains most of the material which the task force intends to publish as a Group Note in December 2008. A Japanese version is also available. Learn more about W3C's Internationalization Activity. (Permalink)
2008-10-14: Social networking is a complex, rapidly expanding, and in some cases, disruptive sector of the information economy. For example, user-generated content is causing changes in the traditional content/media industry structure. In the future, community features may well become an integral part of all digital experiences from information/publishing to business and entertainment. Companies providing services for social media and social networking must anticipate barriers to industry growth and stability. W3C believes that now is the time for industry to gather to discuss their experience so far, and what barriers they foresee in the near- and medium-term. W3C therefore invites people to participate in a Workshop on the Future of Social Networking, to analyze risks and opportunities of the social networking industry, and to define plans for the future. The Workshop will be held 15-16 January 2009 in Barcelona (Spain) and is hosted by Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya and ReadyPeople. Anyone may attend, but position papers are required and are due November 20. Instructions for Workshop registration/participation will be sent exclusively to authors of submitted position papers. Read more about the Workshop scope and sponsorship opportunities. (Permalink)
2008-10-13: W3C invites people to participate in a Workshop on Speaker biometrics and VoiceXML 3.0 on 5-6 March 2009 in Menlo Park, California (USA), hosted by SRI International. Attendees will discuss directions for Speaker Identification and Verification (SIV) standards work, and in particular, requirements for SIV and SIV standards relevant to VoiceXML 3.0. The goal of the Workshop is to help the Voice Browser Working Group integrate existing and in-process standards with VoiceXML 3.0 specification and make the specification more useful in current and emerging markets. Position papers are due 18 December 2008. Read about Voice Extensible Markup Language (VoiceXML) 3.0 Requirements, Voice Browser and learn more about W3C Workshops. (Permalink)
2008-10-09: The OWL Working Group published seven documents yesterday relating to the OWL 2 Web Ontology Language. OWL 2 extends OWL, a core standard of the Semantic Web, adding new features that users have requested and that software providers are prepared to implement. The documents are:
The first three documents form the technical core of OWL 2, which has both a traditional "direct" semantics (for OWL DL) and a new "RDF-based" semantics (for OWL Full). Documents 4 and 5 specify two different serializations for OWL ontologies, one based on RDF and one using XML more directly. Document 6 defines useful subsets of OWL which may be easier to implement or may better meet certain performance requirements. Finally, document 7 specifies conformance and will later enumerate the OWL 2 test cases. Five other documents are under development; but they are not yet ready for public review. Learn more about the Semantic Web Activity. (Permalink)
2008-10-09: The Web Applications Working Group has published the First Public Working Draft of Widgets 1.0: Updates. This specification defines a model to allow a widget user agent to locate and replace a widget resource with a new or different version of a widget resource. The updates model is designed to work both over HTTP and from local storage. For updates performed via the Web, the model makes use a simple XML documents that authors place on a Web server to indicate, amongst other things, where the next most suitable version of a widget resource can be retrieved from. It also defines a mechanism that allows authors to be notified of installation errors or success. This specification also describes how to renegotiate security policies when widgets are updated. Learn more about the Rich Web Client Activity. (Permalink)
2008-10-08: W3C updated its XHTML Modularization standard today with support for designing modular languages using XML Schema. The addition of schemas to XHTML Modularization 1.1 is an important step towards the XHTML2 Working Group's goal that XHTML support rich Web content and be extensible, while remaining interoperable. A modularization standard allows language designers to reuse elements defined by multiple parties (including other W3C standards such as SVG and MathML) and combine them into new formats to meet specific application needs. The standard allows people to use schema-enabled, off-the-shelf tools to immediately begin authoring and validating documents written in those new languages. The XHTML2 Working Group, which gained experience using Modularization 1.1 to build some modules and languages, now plans to add schema support to other XHTML standards. Learn more about the HTML Activity. (Permalink)
2008-10-06: The SYMM Working Group has published the Proposed Recommendation of Synchronized Multimedia Integration Language (SMIL 3.0), pronounced "smile." SMIL 3.0 allows authors to write interactive multimedia presentations. Using SMIL 3.0, an author may describe the temporal behavior of a multimedia presentation, associate hyperlinks with media objects and describe the layout of the presentation on a screen. SMIL 3.0 is a modular XML application: its components may be used in other XML formats. SMIL also defines mobile profiles that incorporate features useful within the industry. Comments are welcome through 6 November. Read more about the Synchronized Multimedia Activity. See also W3C's new Video on the Web Activity. (Permalink)
2008-10-03: The Web Applications Working Group has published the Working Draft of XMLHttpRequest Level 2. The specification enhances XMLHttpRequest with new features, such as cross-site requests, progress events, and the handling of byte streams for both sending and receiving. Learn more about the Rich Web Client Activity. (Permalink)
2008-10-02: Browse W3C presentations and events also available as an RSS channel. (Permalink)
2008-09-30: W3C invites people to participate in a Workshop on Security for Access to Device APIs from the Web to be hosted by Vodafone in London (UK) on 10-11 December 2008. The goal of this workshop is to bring together people from a wide variety of backgrounds (API designers, security experts, usability experts, ...) to discuss the security challenges involved in allowing Web applications and widgets to access the APIs that allow to control these features (e.g., cameras, gps, address books, etc.). Participants will also advise the W3C on appropriate next steps for any gap that needs to be addressed with new technical work. Position papers are due 30 October. W3C invites you to read more about the Workshop scope. (Permalink)
2008-09-22: The Mobile Web Initiative Device Description Working Group has published the Proposed Recommendation of Device Description Repository Simple API. Web content delivered to mobile devices usually benefits from being tailored to take into account a range of factors such as screen size, markup language support and image format support. Such information is stored in "Device Description Repositories" (DDRs). This document describes a simple API for access to DDRs, in order to ease and promote the development of Web content that adapts to its Delivery Context. Comments are welcome through 31 October. Learn more about the Mobile Web Initiative Activity. (Permalink)
2008-09-19: The number of location-aware Web devices has increased dramatically as of late: built-in Global Positioning System (GPS) receivers and mobile phone tower triangulation services have made mobile phones location-aware, Wifi triangulation services brings location information to Wifi enabled devices, GPS receivers now have Web connectivity. Location, location, location!
Thus far there has been no standard method for these devices to make their location available to Web applications, and so in response to requests from the community W3C has created the new Geolocation Working Group, which is chartered to develop a standardized interface to provide location information to Web applications and thus enable an exciting new class applications. This new group is part of W3C's Ubiquitous Web Applications Activity. (Permalink)
2008-09-19: The Efficient XML Interchange Working Group has published the Last Call Working Draft of Efficient XML Interchange (EXI) Format 1.0. EXI is a very compact representation for the Extensible Markup Language (XML) Information Set that is intended to simultaneously optimize performance and the utilization of computational resources. The EXI format uses a hybrid approach drawn from the information and formal language theories, plus practical techniques verified by measurements, for entropy encoding XML information. Using a relatively simple algorithm, which is amenable to fast and compact implementation, and a small set of data types, it reliably produces efficient encodings of XML event streams. Comments are welcome through 07 November. Learn more about the Extensible Markup Language (XML) Activity. (Permalink)
2008-09-17: The WebCGM Working Group has published the First Public Last Call Working Draft of WebCGM 2.1. Computer Graphics Metafile (CGM) is an ISO standard, defined by ISO/IEC 8632:1999, for the interchange of 2D vector and mixed vector/raster graphics. WebCGM is a profile of CGM, which adds Web linking and is optimized for Web applications in technical illustration, electronic documentation, geophysical data visualization, and similar fields. First published (1.0) in 1999, WebCGM unifies potentially diverse approaches to CGM utilization in Web document applications. It therefore represents a significant interoperability agreement amongst major users and implementers of the ISO CGM standard. Comments are welcome through 01 November. Learn more about the Graphics Activity. (Permalink)
NexTag.com is the leading comparison shopping site for products, financial services, travel, automobiles, real estate, education and more. NexTag supports W3C efforts to enhance the user experience and is committed to the organization’s development of open standards. (Member testimonials)
W3C would like to thank the Supporters who have contributed financially or through a donation of goods to W3C.
Read about the layout and send comments about this page. Syndicate this page with RSS 1.0, an RDF vocabulary used for site summaries.
Webmaster · Last modified: $Date: 2008/10/15 20:50:17 $ |Copyright © 1994-2008 W3C® (MIT, ERCIM, Keio), All Rights Reserved. W3C liability, trademark, document use and software licensing rules apply. Your interactions with this site are in accordance with our public and Member privacy statements.