RDF Web Applications Working Group

The mission of the RDF Web Applications Working Group, formerly the W3C RDFa Working Group and part of the Semantic Web Activity, is to support the developing use of RDF for embedding and handling structured data in Web documents in general. The Working Group will publish W3C Recommendations to extend and enhance the currently published RDFa 1.0 documents, including an API, as well as a general RDF API aimed at ECMAScript. The Working Group will also support the HTML Working Group in its work on incorporating RDFa in HTML5 and XHTML5 (as a followup on the the currently published Working Draft for RDFa 1.0 in HTML5)

The RDF Web Applications Working Group Charter shows what the W3C has asked this working group to do.

W3C Standards and Notes

• As they are created, links to the draft specifications from this group will be here for public inspection.

Inputs

• RDFa in XHTML: Syntax and Processing, W3C Recommendation, October 18, 2008, Ben Adida, Mark Birbeck, Shane McCarron, Steven Pemberton, eds.
• RDFa Primer, W3C Working Group Note, October 14, 2008, Ben Adida, Mark Birbeck, eds.

See the Working Group Wiki for further input documents, drafts, etc.

Schedule of Deliverables

(The titles of the documents are indicative only at this point)

• RDFa 1.1 Core, Recommendation: This document will specify the common RDFa attribute sets that may be included by other languages such as XHTML, HTML, or general XML applications like SVG or ODF.
• RDFa 1.1 in XHTML1.1, Recommendation: This document will be based on the RDFa 1.1 Core document and specify RDFa usage in XHTML1.1 documents.
• RDFa 1.1 Lite, Recommendation: This document defines a small subset of RDFa consisting of a few attributes that may be applied to most simple to moderate structured data markup tasks.
• RDFa 1.1 Primer, Note: The RDFa Primer document will be updated to include RDFa 1.1 modifications.
• RDFa 1.1 API, Recommendation: This document will define a generic API for accessing RDFa data contained in the current page. The working group considers dropping this work item, due to lack of available resources and low market interest. The current results will be published as a Working Draft.
  
• RDF Interfaces, Recommendation: This document will define a generic API for accessing RDF data contained in the current page. The working group considers dropping this work item, due to lack of available resources and low market interest. The current results will be published as a Working Draft.
• RDFa Usage Cookbook, Note: Document on the usage of major vocabularies and ontologies for typical RDFa applications. Publication of this note is optional. The working group considers dropping this work item as a formal publication, due to lack of available resources, though intends to set up suitable wiki pages and contribute to outreach activities on RDFa.

Although not formally part of the deliverables of this group, it is also the goal to strongly cooperate with the HTML Working Group in publishing an RDFa in HTML5 document, in case the decision of the HTML WG is to finalize that document as a Recommendation.

Milestones

Timeline View Summary

This timeline view is based on the charter extension in January 2012.

• February 2010: First teleconference
• April 2010: First Public Working Draft for the RDFa 1.1 Core and XHTML+RDFa 1.1 Recommendation track documents
• May 2010: First Public Working Draft for the Primer
• June 2010: First Public Working Draft for the RDFa API
  
• October 2010: 1st Last Call Working Draft for the RDFa 1.1 Core and XHTML+RDFa 1.1 Recommendation track documents
• May 2011: 1st Public Working Draft for the RDF Interfaces
• December 2011: First Public Working Draft for the RDFa 1.1 Lite Recommendatation Track document
• January 2012: 2nd Last Call Working Drafts for the RDFa 1.1 Core, XHTML+RDFa 1.1, and RDFa 1.1 Lite Recommendation track documents
• March 2012: Candidate Recommendation for the RDFa 1.1 Core, XHTML+RDFa 1.1, and RDFa 1.1 Lite Recommendation track documents
• April 2012: Last Call Working Draft for the RDFa Primer
• April 2012: Proposed Recommendations for the RDFa 1.1 Core, XHTML+RDFa 1.1, and RDFa 1.1 Lite Recommendation track documents
• May 2012: Publication of the RDFa 1.1 Core, XHTML+RDFa 1.1, and RDFa 1.1 Lite Recommendations
• May 2012: Publication of the RDFa Primer Working Group Note
• June 2012: Publication of the RDFa Interfaces, RDF and RDFa API documents as Working Drafts

Group Membership and Joining

We encourage new members of the group to introduce themselves by email. The full RDFa WG participants list is available to W3C members.

If you want to join the group:

• If you're affiliated with a W3C member organization
  1. Use the form for getting a W3C account
  2. Have your AC representative nominate you using the form for joining this WG.
• Otherwise, contact the chair and team contact about invited expert status. That will involve getting an account and filling out a form for copyright, patent, etc. policies.

Meeting Records

See the corresponding Wiki page.

W3C Working Group Resources

• Art of Consensus Guide (W3C member confidential)
• World Wide Web Consortium Process Document 14 October 2005
• W3C Groups, Participants (dbwg) (W3C member confidential)