Public Newsletter

Live Training Sessions On Mobile Web Design Rescheduled

2009-07-03: Originally scheduled for July, W3C has rescheduled a Live Training Sessions On Mobile Web Design for 13 October 2009. Students will attend a full day of lectures and hands on sessions about the W3C Mobile Web Best Practices standard, and more generally on mobile Web design. Read the full announcement, register, and learn more about the W3C Mobile Web Initiative. (Permalink)

Last Call for Six Rule Interchange Format (RIF) Drafts

2009-07-03: The Rule Interchange Format (RIF) Working Group has published six Last Call Working Drafts. Together, they allow systems using a variety of rule languages and rule-based technologies to interoperate with each other and with other Semantic Web technologies. Three of the drafts define XML formats with formal semantics for storing and transmitting rules:

• The RIF Production Rule Dialect (PRD) is designed for the kinds of rules used in modern Business Rule Management systems.
• The RIF Basic Logic Dialect (BLD) is a foundation for Logic Programming, classical logic, and related formalisms.
• The RIF Core Dialect is the common subset of PRD and BLD, useful when having a ubiquitous platform is paramount.

The other drafts:

• RIF Datatypes and Builtins (DTB) specifies the datatypes and standard operations (modeled on XPath Functions) available in all RIF dialects
• RIF RDF and OWL Compatibility specifies how RIF works with RDF, RDFS, OWL 1, and OWL 2.
• RIF Framework for Logic Dialects (FLD) provides a mechanism for specifying extended dialects, beyond BLD, when more expressive power is required.

The Working Group requests comments be sent to public-rif-comments@w3.org by 31 July 2009. Learn more about the Semantic Web Activity. (Permalink)

W3C Launches Device APIs and Policy Working Group

2009-07-03: W3C launched a new Device APIs and Policy Working Group, co-Chaired by Robin Berjon (Vodafone) and Frederick Hirsch (Nokia). The group's mission is to create client-side APIs that enable the development of Web Applications and Web Widgets that interact with devices services such as Calendar, Contacts, and Camera. Additionally, the group will produce a framework for the expression of security policies that govern access to security-critical APIs (such as the APIs listed previously). Per its charter, this group will conduct its work in public. Learn more about the Device APIs and Policy Working Group. (Permalink)

Summary of Workshop on Speaker Biometrics and VoiceXML 3.0 Available

2009-07-02: W3C has published a summary and full minutes of the Workshop on Speaker biometrics and VoiceXML 3.0, that took place in Menlo Park, California on 5-6 March. Participants from 15 organizations focused discussion on Speaker Identification and Verification (SIV) functionality within VoiceXML 3.0, and identifying and prioritizing directions for the functionality. The major "takeaways" from the Workshop were confirmation that SIV fits into the VoiceXML space and creation of the "Menlo Park Model", a SIV available VoiceXML architecture. The Working Group will continue to discuss how to include the requirements expressed at the Workshop into VoiceXML 3.0 and improve the specification. Learn more about the Voice Browser Activity. (Permalink)

First Draft of SPARQL New Features and Rationale

2009-07-02: The SPARQL Working Group has published the First Public Working Draft of SPARQL New Features and Rationale. This document provides an overview of the main new features of SPARQL and their rationale. This is an update to SPARQL adding several new features that have been agreed by the SPARQL WG. These language features were determined based on real applications and user and tool-developer experience. Learn more about the Semantic Web Activity. (Permalink)

Last Call: CSS3 module: Multi-column layout

2009-06-30: The Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) Working Group has published a Last Call Working Draft of CSS3 module: Multi-column layout. This module describes multi-column layout in CSS. It builds on the CSS3 Box model module and adds functionality to flow the content of an element into multiple columns. Comments are welcome through 01 October. Learn more about the Style Activity. (Permalink)

Two SML Notes: XLink Reference Scheme, EPR-Based Reference Schemes

2009-06-30: The Service Modeling Language Working Group has published two Working Group Notes: The SML XLink Reference Scheme and Framework for SML EPR-Based Reference Schemes. The Service Modeling Language specification extends the Extensible Mark-up Language and XML Schema with a mechanism for incorporating into XML documents references to other documents or document fragments. The first note addresses the construction of an SML reference scheme based on the XML Linking Language. The second addresses the construction of SML reference schemes for document or document fragment references that employ WS-Addressing endpoint references (EPRs). Learn more about the Extensible Markup Language (XML) Activity. (Permalink)

Steve Bratt to Assume Full-Time Role as Web Foundation CEO

2009-06-26: As of 30 June, Steven R. Bratt will step down from his role as W3C CEO in order to pursue full-time the role of CEO of the World Wide Web Foundation. The Web Foundation was announced in September 2008 with a mission to advance the Web, connect humanity, and empower people. Steve has been part-time CEO of the Web Foundation since then.

While W3C COO and then CEO, Steve was responsible for W3C's worldwide operations and outreach, including overall management of Member relations, the W3C Process, the staff, strategic planning, budget, legal matters, external liaisons and major events. His purposeful and thoughtful leadership at W3C was informed by previous experiences in research, industry, and government, where he served on scientific and arms control delegations among others.

While W3C seeks to fill the open position, Ralph Swick assumes Steve's leadership responsibilities. Thomas Roessler steps up in the interim to take on the role of Technology and Society Domain Lead.

The mission of the Web Foundation complements that of W3C, and the two organizations will continue to coordinate their efforts to make the Web useful and available to all. W3C looks forward to Steve's successful leadership of the Web Foundation. (Permalink)

First Authorized Translation of WCAG 2.0 Published

2009-06-26: W3C announces the French Authorized Translation of Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0, Règles pour l'accessibilité des contenus Web (WCAG) 2.0. It is the first of several planned WCAG 2.0 Translations: Brazilian Portuguese, Catalan, Chinese, Czech, Danish, Dutch, German, Hindi, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Swedish, and other languages. Translations are listed on the WCAG 2.0 Translations page and announced via the WAI Interest Group mailing list and WAI RSS feed. Learn more about translating W3C documents, Policy for Authorized W3C Translations, WCAG 2.0, and the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI). (Permalink)

W3C Invites Implementations of Widgets 1.0: Digital Signatures

2009-06-25: The Web Applications Working Group invites implementation of the Candidate Recommendation of Widgets 1.0: Digital Signatures. Widgets are full-fledged client-side applications that are authored using Web standards and packaged for distribution. This document defines a profile of the XML Signature Syntax and Processing 1.1 specification to allow a widget package to be digitally signed, helping to ensure continuity of authorship and distributorship. Learn more about the Rich Web Client Activity. (Permalink)

W3C Workshop on Using Ink in Multimodal Applications Canceled

2009-06-25: The Workshop on Using Ink in Multimodal Applications, which was planned for 10-11 July 2009 in Grand Bend, Ontario (Canada), has been canceled. The goal of the Workshop was to help the Multimodal Interaction Working Group integrate handwriting modality components (Ink Modality Components) into the MMI Architecture and clarify what should be added to the Multimodal specifications to enable applications to adapt to various modality combinations including Ink. The group is planning to meet face-to-face during W3C's TPAC 2009, and will continue to discuss possible extensions for InkML and how to integrate the specification into the architecture. Read about the Ink Markup Language (InkML) and W3C's Multimodal Interaction Activity. (Permalink)

Five Web Services Drafts Updated

2009-06-25: The Web Services Resource Access Working Group published updates to five Working Drafts: Web Services Enumeration (WS-Enumeration), Web Services Eventing (WS-Eventing), Web Services Resource Transfer (WS-RT), Web Services Transfer (WS-Transfer), and Web Services Metadata Exchange (WS-MetadataExchange). The first describes a general SOAP-based protocol for enumerating a sequence of XML elements that is suitable for traversing logs, message queues, or other linear information models. The second describes a protocol that allows Web services to subscribe to or accept subscriptions for event notification. The third defines extensions to WS-Transfer that deal primarily with fragment-based access to resources to satisfy the common requirements of WS-ResourceFramework and WS-Management. The fourth describes a general SOAP-based protocol for accessing XML representations of Web service-based resources. The fifth defines how metadata associated with a Web service endpoint can be represented as resources, how metadata can be embedded in endpoint references, and how metadata could be retrieved from a Web service endpoint. Learn more about the Web Services Activity. (Permalink)

Note Published: W3C mobileOK Scheme 1.0

2009-06-25: The Mobile Web Best Practices Working Group has published a Group Note of W3C mobileOK Scheme 1.0. W3C's mobileOK is designed to improve the Web experience for users of mobile devices by rewarding content providers that adhere to good practice when delivering content to them. This document describes the mobileOK scheme, which allows content providers to promote their content as being suitable for use on very basic mobile devices. Learn more about the Mobile Web Initiative Activity. (Permalink)