If an a or area hyperlink element has a ping attribute, and the user follows the hyperlink, and the hyperlink's URL can be resolved, relative to the hyperlink element, without failure, then the user agent must take the ping attribute's value, split that string on spaces, resolve each resulting token relative to the hyperlink element, and then should send a request (as described below) to each of the resulting absolute URLs. (Tokens that fail to resolve are ignored.) This may be done in parallel with the primary request, and is independent of the result of that request.

User agents should allow the user to adjust this behavior, for example in conjunction with a setting that disables the sending of HTTP Referer (sic) headers. Based on the user's preferences, UAs may either ignore the ping attribute altogether, or selectively ignore URLs in the list (e.g. ignoring any third-party URLs).

For URLs that are HTTP URLs, the requests must be performed by fetching the specified URLs using the POST method, with an entity body with the MIME type text/ping consisting of the four-character string "PING", from the origin of the Document containing the hyperlink. All relevant cookie and HTTP authentication headers must be included in the request. Which other headers are required depends on the URLs involved.

If both the address of the Document object containing the hyperlink being audited and the ping URL have the same origin
The request must include a Ping-From HTTP header with, as its value, the address of the document containing the hyperlink, and a Ping-To HTTP header with, as its value, the address of the absolute URL of the target of the hyperlink. The request must not include a Referer (sic) HTTP header.
Otherwise, if the origins are different, but the document containing the hyperlink being audited was not retrieved over an encrypted connection
The request must include a Referer (sic) HTTP header with, as its value, the current address of the document containing the hyperlink, a Ping-From HTTP header with the same value, and a Ping-To HTTP header with, as its value, the address of the target of the hyperlink.
Otherwise, the origins are different and the document containing the hyperlink being audited was retrieved over an encrypted connection
The request must include a Ping-To HTTP header with, as its value, the address of the target of the hyperlink. The request must neither include a Referer (sic) HTTP header nor include a Ping-From HTTP header.

To save bandwidth, implementors might also wish to consider omitting optional headers such as Accept from these requests.

User agents must, unless otherwise specified by the user, honor the HTTP headers (including, in particular, redirects and HTTP cookie headers), but must ignore any entity bodies returned in the responses. User agents may close the connection prematurely once they start receiving an entity body. [COOKIES]

For URLs that are not HTTP URLs, the requests must be performed by fetching the specified URL normally, and discarding the results.

When the ping attribute is present, user agents should clearly indicate to the user that following the hyperlink will also cause secondary requests to be sent in the background, possibly including listing the actual target URLs.

For example, a visual user agent could include the hostnames of the target ping URLs along with the hyperlink's actual URL in a status bar or tooltip.

The ping attribute is redundant with pre-existing technologies like HTTP redirects and JavaScript in allowing Web pages to track which off-site links are most popular or allowing advertisers to track click-through rates.

However, the ping attribute provides these advantages to the user over those alternatives:

Thus, while it is possible to track users without this feature, authors are encouraged to use the ping attribute so that the user agent can make the user experience more transparent.

4.12.3 Link types

The following table summarizes the link types that are defined by this specification. This table is non-normative; the actual definitions for the link types are given in the next few sections.

In this section, the term referenced document refers to the resource identified by the element representing the link, and the term current document refers to the resource within which the element representing the link finds itself.

To determine which link types apply to a link, a, or area element, the element's rel attribute must be split on spaces. The resulting tokens are the link types that apply to that element.

Except where otherwise specified, a keyword must not be specified more than once per rel attribute.

The link types that contain no U+003A COLON characters (:), including all those defined in this specification, are ASCII case-insensitive values, and must be compared as such.

Thus, rel="next" is the same as rel="NEXT".

Link type Effect on... Brief description
link a and area
alternate Hyperlink Hyperlink Gives alternate representations of the current document.
archives Hyperlink Hyperlink Provides a link to a collection of records, documents, or other materials of historical interest.
author Hyperlink Hyperlink Gives a link to the current document's author.
bookmark not allowed Hyperlink Gives the permalink for the nearest ancestor section.
external not allowed Hyperlink Indicates that the referenced document is not part of the same site as the current document.
first Hyperlink Hyperlink Indicates that the current document is a part of a series, and that the first document in the series is the referenced document.
help Hyperlink Hyperlink Provides a link to context-sensitive help.
icon External Resource not allowed Imports an icon to represent the current document.
index Hyperlink Hyperlink Gives a link to the document that provides a table of contents or index listing the current document.
last Hyperlink Hyperlink Indicates that the current document is a part of a series, and that the last document in the series is the referenced document.
license Hyperlink Hyperlink Indicates that the main content of the current document is covered by the copyright license described by the referenced document.
next Hyperlink Hyperlink Indicates that the current document is a part of a series, and that the next document in the series is the referenced document.
nofollow not allowed Hyperlink Indicates that the current document's original author or publisher does not endorse the referenced document.
noreferrer not allowed Hyperlink Requires that the user agent not send an HTTP Referer (sic) header if the user follows the hyperlink.
pingback External Resource not allowed Gives the address of the pingback server that handles pingbacks to the current document.
prefetch External Resource not allowed Specifies that the target resource should be preemptively cached.
prev Hyperlink Hyperlink Indicates that the current document is a part of a series, and that the previous document in the series is the referenced document.
search Hyperlink Hyperlink Gives a link to a resource that can be used to search through the current document and its related pages.
stylesheet External Resource not allowed Imports a stylesheet.
sidebar Hyperlink Hyperlink Specifies that the referenced document, if retrieved, is intended to be shown in the browser's sidebar (if it has one).
tag Hyperlink Hyperlink Gives a tag (identified by the given address) that applies to the current document.
up Hyperlink Hyperlink Provides a link to a document giving the context for the current document.

Some of the types described below list synonyms for these values. These are to be handled as specified by user agents, but must not be used in documents.

The alternate keyword may be used with link, a, and area elements. For link elements, if the rel attribute does not also contain the keyword stylesheet, it creates a hyperlink; but if it does also contain the keyword stylesheet, the alternate keyword instead modifies the meaning of the stylesheet keyword in the way described for that keyword, and the rest of this subsection doesn't apply.

The alternate keyword indicates that the referenced document is an alternate representation of the current document.

The nature of the referenced document is given by the media, hreflang, and type attributes.

If the alternate keyword is used with the media attribute, it indicates that the referenced document is intended for use with the media specified.

If the alternate keyword is used with the hreflang attribute, and that attribute's value differs from the root element's language, it indicates that the referenced document is a translation.

If the alternate keyword is used with the type attribute, it indicates that the referenced document is a reformulation of the current document in the specified format.

The media, hreflang, and type attributes can be combined when specified with the alternate keyword.

For example, the following link is a French translation that uses the PDF format:

<link rel=alternate type=application/pdf hreflang=fr href=manual-fr>

If the alternate keyword is used with the type attribute set to the value application/rss+xml or the value application/atom+xml, then it indicates that the referenced document is a syndication feed (though not necessarily syndicating exactly the same content as the current page).

The first link, a, or area element in the document (in tree order) with the alternate keyword used with the type attribute set to the value application/rss+xml or the value application/atom+xml must be treated as the default syndication feed for the purposes of feed autodiscovery.

The following link element gives the syndication feed for the current page:

<link rel="alternate" type="application/atom+xml" href="data.xml">

The following extract offers various different syndication feeds:

<p>You can access the planets database using Atom feeds:</p>
<ul>
 <li><a href="recently-visited-planets.xml" rel="alternate" type="application/atom+xml">Recently Visited Planets</a></li>
 <li><a href="known-bad-planets.xml" rel="alternate" type="application/atom+xml">Known Bad Planets</a></li>
 <li><a href="unexplored-planets.xml" rel="alternate" type="application/atom+xml">Unexplored Planets</a></li>
</ul>

The alternate link relationship is transitive — that is, if a document links to two other documents with the link type "alternate", then, in addition to implying that those documents are alternative representations of the first document, it is also implying that those two documents are alternative representations of each other.

The archives keyword may be used with link, a, and area elements. For link elements, it creates a hyperlink.

The archives keyword indicates that the referenced document describes a collection of records, documents, or other materials of historical interest.

A blog's index page could link to an index of the blog's past posts with rel="archives".

Synonyms: For historical reasons, user agents must also treat the keyword "archive" like the archives keyword.

The author keyword may be used with link, a, and area elements. For link elements, it creates a hyperlink.

For a and area elements, the author keyword indicates that the referenced document provides further information about the author of the nearest article element ancestor of the element defining the hyperlink, if there is one, or of the page as a whole, otherwise.

For link elements, the author keyword indicates that the referenced document provides further information about the author for the page as a whole.

The "referenced document" can be, and often is, a mailto: URL giving the e-mail address of the author. [MAILTO]

Synonyms: For historical reasons, user agents must also treat link, a, and area elements that have a rev attribute with the value "made" as having the author keyword specified as a link relationship.

The bookmark keyword may be used with a and area elements.

The bookmark keyword gives a permalink for the nearest ancestor article element of the linking element in question, or of the section the linking element is most closely associated with, if there are no ancestor article elements.

The following snippet has three permalinks. A user agent could determine which permalink applies to which part of the spec by looking at where the permalinks are given.

 ...
 <body>
  <h1>Example of permalinks</h1>
  <div id="a">
   <h2>First example</h2>
   <p><a href="a.html" rel="bookmark">This</a> permalink applies to
   only the content from the first H2 to the second H2. The DIV isn't
   exactly that section, but it roughly corresponds to it.</p>
  </div>
  <h2>Second example</h2>
  <article id="b">
   <p><a href="b.html" rel="bookmark">This</a> permalink applies to
   the outer ARTICLE element (which could be, e.g., a blog post).</p>
   <article id="c">
    <p><a href="c.html" rel="bookmark">This</a> permalink applies to
    the inner ARTICLE element (which could be, e.g., a blog comment).</p>
   </article>
  </article>
 </body>
 ...

The external keyword may be used with a and area elements.

The external keyword indicates that the link is leading to a document that is not part of the site that the current document forms a part of.

The help keyword may be used with link, a, and area elements. For link elements, it creates a hyperlink.

For a and area elements, the help keyword indicates that the referenced document provides further help information for the parent of the element defining the hyperlink, and its children.

In the following example, the form control has associated context-sensitive help. The user agent could use this information, for example, displaying the referenced document if the user presses the "Help" or "F1" key.

 <p><label> Topic: <input name=topic> <a href="help/topic.html" rel="help">(Help)</a></label></p>

For link elements, the help keyword indicates that the referenced document provides help for the page as a whole.

4.12.3.7 Link type "icon"

The icon keyword may be used with link elements, for which it creates an external resource link.

The specified resource is an icon representing the page or site, and should be used by the user agent when representing the page in the user interface.

Icons could be auditory icons, visual icons, or other kinds of icons. If multiple icons are provided, the user agent must select the most appropriate icon according to the type, media, and sizes attributes. If there are multiple equally appropriate icons, user agents must use the last one declared in tree order. If the user agent tries to use an icon but that icon is determined, upon closer examination, to in fact be inappropriate (e.g. because it uses an unsupported format), then the user agent must try the next-most-appropriate icon as determined by the attributes.

There is no default type for resources given by the icon keyword. However, for the purposes of determining the type of the resource, user agents must expect the resource to be an image.

The sizes attribute gives the sizes of icons for visual media.

If specified, the attribute must have a value that is an unordered set of unique space-separated tokens. The values must all be either any or a value that consists of two valid non-negative integers that do not have a leading U+0030 DIGIT ZERO (0) character and that are separated by a single U+0078 LATIN SMALL LETTER X character (x).

The keywords represent icon sizes.

To parse and process the attribute's value, the user agent must first split the attribute's value on spaces, and must then parse each resulting keyword to determine what it represents.

The any keyword represents that the resource contains a scalable icon, e.g. as provided by an SVG image.

Other keywords must be further parsed as follows to determine what they represent:

The keywords specified on the sizes attribute must not represent icon sizes that are not actually available in the linked resource.

If the attribute is not specified, then the user agent must assume that the given icon is appropriate, but less appropriate than an icon of a known and appropriate size.

The following snippet shows the top part of an application with several icons.

<!DOCTYPE HTML>
<html>
 <head>
  <title>lsForums — Inbox</title>
  <link rel=icon href=favicon.png sizes="16x16" type="image/png">
  <link rel=icon href=windows.ico sizes="32x32 48x48" type="image/vnd.microsoft.icon">
  <link rel=icon href=mac.icns sizes="128x128 512x512 8192x8192 32768x32768">
  <link rel=icon href=iphone.png sizes="59x60" type="image/png">
  <link rel=icon href=gnome.svg sizes="any" type="image/svg+xml">
  <link rel=stylesheet href=lsforums.css>
  <script src=lsforums.js></script>
  <meta name=application-name content="lsForums">
 </head>
 <body>
  ...

The license keyword may be used with link, a, and area elements. For link elements, it creates a hyperlink.

The license keyword indicates that the referenced document provides the copyright license terms under which the main content of the current document is provided.

This specification does not specify how to distinguish between the main content of a document and content that is not deemed to be part of that main content. The distinction should be made clear to the user.

Consider a photo sharing site. A page on that site might describe and show a photograph, and the page might be marked up as follows:

<!DOCTYPE HTML>
<html>
 <head>
  <title>Exampl Pictures: Kissat</title>
  <link rel="stylesheet" href="/style/default">
 </head>
 <body>
  <h1>Kissat</h1>
  <nav>
   <a href="../">Return to photo index</a>
  </nav>
  <figure>
   <img src="/pix/39627052_fd8dcd98b5.jpg">
   <figcaption>Kissat</figcaption>
  </figure>
  <p>One of them has six toes!</p>
  <p><small><a rel="license" href="http://www.opensource.org/licenses/mit-license.php">MIT Licensed</a></small></p>
  <footer>
   <a href="/">Home</a> | <a href="../">Photo index</a>
   <p><small>© copyright 2009 Exampl Pictures. All Rights Reserved.</small></p>
  </footer>
 </body>
</html>

In this case the license applies to just the photo (the main content of the document), not the whole document. In particular not the design of the page itself, which is covered by the copyright given at the bottom of the document. This could be made clearer in the styling (e.g. making the license link prominently positioned near the photograph, while having the page copyright in light small text at the foot of the page.

Synonyms: For historical reasons, user agents must also treat the keyword "copyright" like the license keyword.

The nofollow keyword may be used with a and area elements.

The nofollow keyword indicates that the link is not endorsed by the original author or publisher of the page, or that the link to the referenced document was included primarily because of a commercial relationship between people affiliated with the two pages.

The noreferrer keyword may be used with a and area elements.

It indicates that no referrer information is to be leaked when following the link.

If a user agent follows a link defined by an a or area element that has the noreferrer keyword, the user agent must not include a Referer (sic) HTTP header (or equivalent for other protocols) in the request.

This keyword also causes the opener attribute to remain null if the hyperlink creates a new browsing context.

The pingback keyword may be used with link elements, for which it creates an external resource link.

For the semantics of the pingback keyword, see the Pingback 1.0 specification. [PINGBACK]

The prefetch keyword may be used with link elements, for which it creates an external resource link.

The prefetch keyword indicates that preemptively fetching and caching the specified resource is likely to be beneficial, as it is highly likely that the user will require this resource.

There is no default type for resources given by the prefetch keyword.

The search keyword may be used with link, a, and area elements. For link elements, it creates a hyperlink.

The search keyword indicates that the referenced document provides an interface specifically for searching the document and its related resources.

OpenSearch description documents can be used with link elements and the search link type to enable user agents to autodiscover search interfaces. [OPENSEARCH]

The stylesheet keyword may be used with link elements, for which it creates an external resource link that contributes to the styling processing model.

The specified resource is a resource that describes how to present the document. Exactly how the resource is to be processed depends on the actual type of the resource.

If the alternate keyword is also specified on the link element, then the link is an alternative stylesheet; in this case, the title attribute must be specified on the link element, with a non-empty value.

The default type for resources given by the stylesheet keyword is text/css.

Quirk: If the document has been set to quirks mode and the Content-Type metadata of the external resource is not a supported style sheet type, the user agent must instead assume it to be text/css.

The sidebar keyword may be used with link, a, and area elements. For link elements, it creates a hyperlink.

The sidebar keyword indicates that the referenced document, if retrieved, is intended to be shown in a secondary browsing context (if possible), instead of in the current browsing context.

A hyperlink element with the sidebar keyword specified is a sidebar hyperlink.

The tag keyword may be used with link, a, and area elements. For link elements, it creates a hyperlink.

The tag keyword indicates that the tag that the referenced document represents applies to the current document.

Since it indicates that the tag applies to the current document, it would be inappropriate to use this keyword in the markup of a tag cloud, which lists the popular tag across a set of pages.

Some documents form part of a hierarchical structure of documents.

A hierarchical structure of documents is one where each document can have various subdocuments. The document of which a document is a subdocument is said to be the document's parent. A document with no parent forms the top of the hierarchy.

A document may be part of multiple hierarchies.

The index keyword may be used with link, a, and area elements. For link elements, it creates a hyperlink.

The index keyword indicates that the document is part of a hierarchical structure, and that the link is leading to the document that is the top of the hierarchy. It conveys more information when used with the up keyword (q.v.).

Synonyms: For historical reasons, user agents must also treat the keywords "top", "contents", and "toc" like the index keyword.

The up keyword may be used with link, a, and area elements. For link elements, it creates a hyperlink.

The up keyword indicates that the document is part of a hierarchical structure, and that the link is leading to a document that is an ancestor of the current document.

The up keyword may be repeated within a rel attribute to indicate the hierarchical distance from the current document to the referenced document. If it occurs only once, then the link is leading to the current document's parent; each additional occurrence of the keyword represents one further level. If the index keyword is also present, then the number of up keywords is the depth of the current page relative to the top of the hierarchy. Only one link is created for the set of one or more up keywords and, if present, the index keyword.

If the page is part of multiple hierarchies, then they should be described in different paragraphs. User agents must scope any interpretation of the up and index keywords together indicating the depth of the hierarchy to the paragraph in which the link finds itself, if any, or to the document otherwise.

When two links have both the up and index keywords specified together in the same scope and contradict each other by having a different number of up keywords, the link with the greater number of up keywords must be taken as giving the depth of the document.

This can be used to mark up a navigation style sometimes known as bread crumbs. In the following example, the current page can be reached via two paths.

<nav>
 <p>
  <a href="/" rel="index up up up">Main</a> >
  <a href="/products/" rel="up up">Products</a> >
  <a href="/products/dishwashers/" rel="up">Dishwashers</a> >
  <a>Second hand</a>
 </p>
 <p>
  <a href="/" rel="index up up">Main</a> >
  <a href="/second-hand/" rel="up">Second hand</a> >
  <a>Dishwashers</a>
 </p>
</nav>

The relList IDL attribute (e.g. on the a element) does not currently represent multiple up keywords (the interface hides duplicates).

Some documents form part of a sequence of documents.

A sequence of documents is one where each document can have a previous sibling and a next sibling. A document with no previous sibling is the start of its sequence, a document with no next sibling is the end of its sequence.

A document may be part of multiple sequences.

The first keyword may be used with link, a, and area elements. For link elements, it creates a hyperlink.

The first keyword indicates that the document is part of a sequence, and that the link is leading to the document that is the first logical document in the sequence.

Synonyms: For historical reasons, user agents must also treat the keywords "begin" and "start" like the first keyword.

The last keyword may be used with link, a, and area elements. For link elements, it creates a hyperlink.

The last keyword indicates that the document is part of a sequence, and that the link is leading to the document that is the last logical document in the sequence.

Synonyms: For historical reasons, user agents must also treat the keyword "end" like the last keyword.

The next keyword may be used with link, a, and area elements. For link elements, it creates a hyperlink.

The next keyword indicates that the document is part of a sequence, and that the link is leading to the document that is the next logical document in the sequence.

The prev keyword may be used with link, a, and area elements. For link elements, it creates a hyperlink.

The prev keyword indicates that the document is part of a sequence, and that the link is leading to the document that is the previous logical document in the sequence.

Synonyms: For historical reasons, user agents must also treat the keyword "previous" like the prev keyword.

Extensions to the predefined set of link types may be registered in the WHATWG Wiki RelExtensions page. [WHATWGWIKI]

Anyone is free to edit the WHATWG Wiki RelExtensions page at any time to add a type. Extension types must be specified with the following information:

Keyword

The actual value being defined. The value should not be confusingly similar to any other defined value (e.g. differing only in case).

If the value contains a U+003A COLON character (:), it must also be an absolute URL.

Effect on... link

One of the following:

not allowed
The keyword is not allowed to be specified on link elements.
Hyperlink
The keyword may be specified on a link element; it creates a hyperlink link.
External Resource
The keyword may be specified on a link element; it creates a external resource link.
Effect on... a and area

One of the following:

not allowed
The keyword is not allowed to be specified on a and area elements.
Hyperlink
The keyword may be specified on a and area elements.
Brief description

A short non-normative description of what the keyword's meaning is.

Specification

A link to a more detailed description of the keyword's semantics and requirements. It could be another page on the Wiki, or a link to an external page.

Synonyms

A list of other keyword values that have exactly the same processing requirements. Authors should not use the values defined to be synonyms, they are only intended to allow user agents to support legacy content. Anyone may remove synonyms that are not used in practice; only names that need to be processed as synonyms for compatibility with legacy content are to be registered in this way.

Status

One of the following:

Proposed
The keyword has not received wide peer review and approval. Someone has proposed it and is, or soon will be, using it.
Ratified
The keyword has received wide peer review and approval. It has a specification that unambiguously defines how to handle pages that use the keyword, including when they use it in incorrect ways.
Discontinued
The keyword has received wide peer review and it has been found wanting. Existing pages are using this keyword, but new pages should avoid it. The "brief description" and "specification" entries will give details of what authors should use instead, if anything.

If a keyword is found to be redundant with existing values, it should be removed and listed as a synonym for the existing value.

If a keyword is registered in the "proposed" state for a period of a month or more without being used or specified, then it may be removed from the registry.

If a keyword is added with the "proposed" status and found to be redundant with existing values, it should be removed and listed as a synonym for the existing value. If a keyword is added with the "proposed" status and found to be harmful, then it should be changed to "discontinued" status.

Anyone can change the status at any time, but should only do so in accordance with the definitions above.

Conformance checkers must use the information given on the WHATWG Wiki RelExtensions page to establish if a value is allowed or not: values defined in this specification or marked as "proposed" or "ratified" must be accepted when used on the elements for which they apply as described in the "Effect on..." field, whereas values marked as "discontinued" or not listed in either this specification or on the aforementioned page must be rejected as invalid. Conformance checkers may cache this information (e.g. for performance reasons or to avoid the use of unreliable network connectivity).

When an author uses a new type not defined by either this specification or the Wiki page, conformance checkers should offer to add the value to the Wiki, with the details described above, with the "proposed" status.

Types defined as extensions in the WHATWG Wiki RelExtensions page with the status "proposed" or "ratified" may be used with the rel attribute on link, a, and area elements in accordance to the "Effect on..." field. [WHATWGWIKI]

4.13 Common idioms without dedicated elements

4.13.1 Tag clouds

This specification does not define any markup specifically for marking up lists of keywords that apply to a group of pages (also known as tag clouds). In general, authors are encouraged to either mark up such lists using ul elements with explicit inline counts that are then hidden and turned into a presentational effect using a style sheet, or to use SVG.

Here, three tags are included in a short tag cloud:

<style>
@media screen, print, handheld, tv {
  /* should be ignored by non-visual browsers */
  .tag-cloud > li > span { display: none; }
  .tag-cloud > li { display: inline; }
  .tag-cloud-1 { font-size: 0.7em; }
  .tag-cloud-2 { font-size: 0.9em; }
  .tag-cloud-3 { font-size: 1.1em; }
  .tag-cloud-4 { font-size: 1.3em; }
  .tag-cloud-5 { font-size: 1.5em; }
}
</style>
...
<ul class="tag-cloud">
 <li class="tag-cloud-4"><a title="28 instances" href="/t/apple">apple</a> <span>(popular)</span>
 <li class="tag-cloud-2"><a title="6 instances"  href="/t/kiwi">kiwi</a> <span>(rare)</span>
 <li class="tag-cloud-5"><a title="41 instances" href="/t/pear">pear</a> <span>(very popular)</span>
</ul>

The actual frequency of each tag is given using the title attribute. A CSS style sheet is provided to convert the markup into a cloud of differently-sized words, but for user agents that do not support CSS or are not visual, the markup contains annotations like "(popular)" or "(rare)" to categorize the various tags by frequency, thus enabling all users to benefit from the information.

The ul element is used (rather than ol) because the order is not particularly important: while the list is in fact ordered alphabetically, it would convey the same information if ordered by, say, the length of the tag.

The tag rel-keyword is not used on these a elements because they do not represent tags that apply to the page itself; they are just part of an index listing the tags themselves.

4.13.2 Conversations

This specification does not define a specific element for marking up conversations, meeting minutes, chat transcripts, dialogues in screenplays, instant message logs, and other situations where different players take turns in discourse.

Instead, authors are encouraged to mark up conversations using p elements and punctuation. Authors who need to mark the speaker for styling purposes are encouraged to use span or b. Paragraphs with their text wrapped in the i element can be used for marking up stage directions.

This example demonstrates this using an extract from Abbot and Costello's famous sketch, Who's on first:

<p> Costello: Look, you gotta first baseman?
<p> Abbott: Certainly.
<p> Costello: Who's playing first?
<p> Abbott: That's right.
<p> Costello becomes exasperated.
<p> Costello: When you pay off the first baseman every month, who gets the money?
<p> Abbott: Every dollar of it.

The following extract shows how an IM conversation log could be marked up.

<p> <time>14:22</time> <b>egof</b> I'm not that nerdy, I've only seen 30% of the star trek episodes
<p> <time>14:23</time> <b>kaj</b> if you know what percentage of the star trek episodes you have seen, you are inarguably nerdy
<p> <time>14:23</time> <b>egof</b> it's unarguably
<p> <time>14:23</time> <i>* kaj blinks</i>
<p> <time>14:24</time> <b>kaj</b> you are not helping your case

4.13.3 Footnotes

HTML does not have a dedicated mechanism for marking up footnotes. Here are the recommended alternatives.


For short inline annotations, the title attribute should be used.

In this example, two parts of a dialogue are annotated with footnote-like content using the title attribute.

<p> <b>Customer</b>: Hello! I wish to register a complaint. Hello. Miss?
<p> <b>Shopkeeper</b>: <span title="Colloquial pronunciation of 'What do you'"
>Watcha</span> mean, miss?
<p> <b>Customer</b>: Uh, I'm sorry, I have a cold. I wish to make a complaint.
<p> <b>Shopkeeper</b>: Sorry, <span title="This is, of course, a lie.">we're
closing for lunch</span>.

For longer annotations, the a element should be used, pointing to an element later in the document. The convention is that the contents of the link be a number in square brackets.

In this example, a footnote in the dialogue links to a paragraph below the dialogue. The paragraph then reciprocally links back to the dialogue, allowing the user to return to the location of the footnote.

<p> Announcer: Number 16: The <i>hand</i>.
<p> Interviewer: Good evening. I have with me in the studio tonight
Mr Norman St John Polevaulter, who for the past few years has been
contradicting people. Mr Polevaulter, why <em>do</em> you
contradict people?
<p> Norman: I don't. <sup><a href="#fn1" id="r1">[1]</a></sup>
<p> Interviewer: You told me you did!
...
<section>
 <p id="fn1"><a href="#r1">[1]</a> This is, naturally, a lie,
 but paradoxically if it were true he could not say so without
 contradicting the interviewer and thus making it false.</p>
</section>

For side notes, longer annotations that apply to entire sections of the text rather than just specific words or sentences, the aside element should be used.

In this example, a sidebar is given after a dialogue, giving it some context.

<p> <span class="speaker">Customer</span>: I will not buy this record, it is scratched.
<p> <span class="speaker">Shopkeeper</span>: I'm sorry?
<p> <span class="speaker">Customer</span>: I will not buy this record, it is scratched.
<p> <span class="speaker">Shopkeeper</span>: No no no, this's'a tobacconist's.
<aside>
 <p>In 1970, the British Empire lay in ruins, and foreign
 nationalists frequented the streets — many of them Hungarians
 (not the streets — the foreign nationals). Sadly, Alexander
 Yalt has been publishing incompetently-written phrase books.
</aside>

For figures or tables, footnotes can be included in the relevant figcaption or caption element, or in surrounding prose.

In this example, a table has cells with footnotes that are given in prose. A figure element is used to give a single legend to the combination of the table and its footnotes.

<figure>
 <figcaption>Table 1. Alternative activities for knights.</figcaption>
 <table>
  <tr>
   <th> Activity
   <th> Location
   <th> Cost
  <tr>
   <td> Dance
   <td> Wherever possible
   <td> £0<sup><a href="#fn1">1</a></sup>
  <tr>
   <td> Routines, chorus scenes<sup><a href="#fn2">2</a></sup>
   <td> Undisclosed
   <td> Undisclosed
  <tr>
   <td> Dining<sup><a href="#fn3">3</a></sup>
   <td> Camelot
   <td> Cost of ham, jam, and spam<sup><a href="#fn4">4</a></sup>
 </table>
 <p id="fn1">1. Assumed.</p>
 <p id="fn2">2. Footwork impeccable.</p>
 <p id="fn3">3. Quality described as "well".</p>
 <p id="fn4">4. A lot.</p>
</figure>

4.14 Matching HTML elements using selectors

4.14.1 Case-sensitivity

Attribute and element names of HTML elements in HTML documents must be treated as ASCII case-insensitive.

Classes from the class attribute of HTML elements in documents that are in quirks mode must be treated as ASCII case-insensitive.

Attribute selectors on an HTML element in an HTML document must treat the values of attributes with the following names as ASCII case-insensitive:

All other attribute values on HTML elements must be treated as case-sensitive.

4.14.2 Pseudo-classes

There are a number of dynamic selectors that can be used with HTML. This section defines when these selectors match HTML elements.

:link
:visited

All a elements that have an href attribute, all area elements that have an href attribute, and all link elements that have an href attribute, must match one of :link and :visited.

:active

The :active pseudo-class must match the following elements between the time the user begins to activate the element and the time the user stops activating the element:

For example, if the user is using a keyboard to push a button element by pressing the space bar, the element would match this pseudo-class in between the time that the element received the keydown event and the time the element received the keyup event.

:enabled

The :enabled pseudo-class must match the following elements:

:disabled

The :disabled pseudo-class must match the following elements:

:checked

The :checked pseudo-class must match the following elements:

:indeterminate

The :indeterminate pseudo-class must match input elements whose type attribute is in the Checkbox state and whose indeterminate IDL attribute is set to true.

:default

The :default pseudo-class must match the following elements:

:valid

The :valid pseudo-class must match all elements that are candidates for constraint validation and that satisfy their constraints.

:invalid

The :invalid pseudo-class must match all elements that are candidates for constraint validation but that do not satisfy their constraints.

:in-range

The :in-range pseudo-class must match all elements that are candidates for constraint validation and that are neither suffering from an underflow nor suffering from an overflow.

:out-of-range

The :out-of-range pseudo-class must match all elements that are candidates for constraint validation and that are suffering from an underflow or suffering from an overflow.

:required

The :required pseudo-class must match the following elements:

:optional

The :optional pseudo-class must match the following elements:

:read-only
:read-write

The :read-write pseudo-class must match the following elements:

The :read-only pseudo-class must match all other HTML elements.

Another section of this specification defines the target element used with the :target pseudo-class.

This specification does not define when an element matches the :hover, :focus, or :lang() dynamic pseudo-classes, as those are all defined in sufficient detail in a language-agnostic fashion in the Selectors specification. [SELECTORS]

5 Microdata

5.1 Introduction

5.1.1 Overview

This section is non-normative.

Sometimes, it is desirable to annotate content with specific machine-readable labels, e.g. to allow generic scripts to provide services that are customised to the page, or to enable content from a variety of cooperating authors to be processed by a single script in a consistent manner.

For this purpose, authors can use the microdata features described in this section. Microdata allows nested groups of name-value pairs to be added to documents, in parallel with the existing content.

5.1.2 The basic syntax

This section is non-normative.

At a high level, microdata consists of a group of name-value pairs. The groups are called items, and each name-value pair is a property. Items and properties are represented by regular elements.

To create an item, the itemscope attribute is used.

To add a property to an item, the itemprop attribute is used on one of the item's descendants.

Here there are two items, each of which has the property "name":

<div itemscope>
 <p>My name is <span itemprop="name">Elizabeth</span>.</p>
</div>

<div itemscope>
 <p>My name is <span itemprop="name">Daniel</span>.</p>
</div>

Properties generally have values that are strings.

Here the item has three properties:

<div itemscope>
 <p>My name is <span itemprop="name">Neil</span>.</p>
 <p>My band is called <span itemprop="band">Four Parts Water</span>.</p>
 <p>I am <span itemprop="nationality">British</span>.</p>
</div>

Properties can also have values that are URLs. This is achieved using the a element and its href attribute, the img element and its src attribute, or other elements that link to or embed external resources.

In this example, the item has one property, "image", whose value is a URL:

<div itemscope>
 <img itemprop="image" src="google-logo.png" alt="Google">
</div>

Properties can also have values that are dates, times, or dates and times. This is achieved using the time element and its datetime attribute.

In this example, the item has one property, "birthday", whose value is a date:

<div itemscope>
 I was born on <time itemprop="birthday" datetime="2009-05-10">May 10th 2009</time>.
</div>

Properties can also themselves be groups of name-value pairs, by putting the itemscope attribute on the element that declares the property.

Items that are not part of others are called top-level microdata items.

In this example, the outer item represents a person, and the inner one represents a band:

<div itemscope>
 <p>Name: <span itemprop="name">Amanda</span></p>
 <p>Band: <span itemprop="band" itemscope> <span itemprop="name">Jazz Band</span> (<span itemprop="size">12</span> players)</span></p>
</div>

The outer item here has two properties, "name" and "band". The "name" is "Amanda", and the "band" is an item in its own right, with two properties, "name" and "size". The "name" of the band is "Jazz Band", and the "size" is "12".

The outer item in this example is a top-level microdata item.

Properties that are not descendants of the element with the itemscope attribute can be associated with the item using the itemref attribute. This attribute takes a list of IDs of elements to crawl in addition to crawling the children of the element with the itemscope attribute.

This example is the same as the previous one, but all the properties are separated from their items:

<div itemscope id="amanda" itemref="a b"></div>
<p id="a">Name: <span itemprop="name">Amanda</span></p>
<div id="b" itemprop="band" itemscope itemref="c"></div>
<div id="c">
 <p>Band: <span itemprop="name">Jazz Band</span></p>
 <p>Size: <span itemprop="size">12</span> players</p>
</div>

This gives the same result as the previous example. The first item has two properties, "name", set to "Amanda", and "band", set to another item. That second item has two further properties, "name", set to "Jazz Band", and "size", set to "12".

An item can have multiple properties with the same name and different values.

This example describes an ice cream, with two flavors:

<div itemscope>
 <p>Flavors in my favorite ice cream:</p>
 <ul>
  <li itemprop="flavor">Lemon sorbet</li>
  <li itemprop="flavor">Apricot sorbet</li>
 </ul>
</div>

This thus results in an item with two properties, both "flavor", having the values "Lemon sorbet" and "Apricot sorbet".

An element introducing a property can also introduce multiple properties at once, to avoid duplication when some of the properties have the same value.

Here we see an item with two properties, "favorite-color" and "favorite-fruit", both set to the value "orange":

<div itemscope>
 <span itemprop="favorite-color favorite-fruit">orange</span>
</div>

It's important to note that there is no relationship between the microdata and the content of the document where the microdata is marked up.

There is no semantic difference, for instance, between the following two examples:

<figure>
 <img src="castle.jpeg">
 <figcaption><span itemscope><span itemprop="name">The Castle</span></span> (1986)</figcaption>
</figure>
<span itemscope><meta itemprop="name" content="The Castle"></span>
<figure>
 <img src="castle.jpeg">
 <figcaption>The Castle (1986)</figcaption>
</figure>

Both have a figure with a caption, and both, completely unrelated to the figure, have an item with a name-value pair with the name "name" and the value "The Castle". The only difference is that if the user drags the caption out of the document, in the former case, the item will be included in the drag-and-drop data. In neither case is the image in any way associated with the item.

5.1.3 Typed items

This section is non-normative.

The examples in the previous section show how information could be marked up on a page that doesn't expect its microdata to be re-used. Microdata is most useful, though, when it is used in contexts where other authors and readers are able to cooperate to make new uses of the markup.

For this purpose, it is necessary to give each item a type, such as "http://example.com/person", or "http://example.org/cat", or "http://band.example.net/". Types are identified as URLs.

The type for an item is given as the value of an itemtype attribute on the same element as the itemscope attribute.

Here, the item is "http://example.org/animals#cat":

<section itemscope itemtype="http://example.org/animals#cat">
 <h1 itemprop="name">Hedral</h1>
 <p itemprop="desc">Hedral is a male american domestic
 shorthair, with a fluffy black fur with white paws and belly.</p>
 <img itemprop="img" src="hedral.jpeg" alt="" title="Hedral, age 18 months">
</section>

In this example the "http://example.org/animals#cat" item has three properties, a "name" ("Hedral"), a "desc" ("Hedral is..."), and an "img" ("hedral.jpeg").

An item can only have one type. The type gives the context for the properties, thus defining a vocabulary: a property named "class" given for an item with the type "http://census.example/person" might refer to the economic class of an individual, while a property named "class" given for an item with the type "http://example.com/school/teacher" might refer to the classroom a teacher has been assigned.

5.1.4 Global identifiers for items

This section is non-normative.

Sometimes, an item gives information about a topic that has a global identifier. For example, books can be identified by their ISBN number.

Vocabularies (as identified by the itemtype attribute) can be designed such that items get associated with their global identifier in an unambiguous way by expressing the global identifiers as URLs given in an itemid attribute.

The exact meaning of the URLs given in itemid attributes depends on the vocabulary used.

Here, an item is talking about a particular book:

<dl itemscope
    itemtype="http://vocab.example.net/book"
    itemid="urn:isbn:0-330-34032-8">
 <dt>Title
 <dd itemprop="title">The Reality Dysfunction
 <dt>Author
 <dd itemprop="author">Peter F. Hamilton
 <dt>Publication date
 <dd><time itemprop="pubdate" datetime="1996-01-26">26 January 1996</time>
</dl>

The "http://vocab.example.net/book" vocabulary in this example would define that the itemid attribute takes a urn: URL pointing to the ISBN of the book.

5.1.5 Selecting names when defining vocabularies

This section is non-normative.

Using microdata means using a vocabulary. For some purposes, an ad-hoc vocabulary is adequate. For others, a vocabulary will need to be designed. Where possible, authors are encouraged to re-use existing vocabularies, as this makes content re-use easier.

When designing new vocabularies, identifiers can be created either using URLs, or, for properties, as plain words (with no dots or colons). For URLs, conflicts with other vocabularies can be avoided by only using identifiers that correspond to pages that the author has control over.

For instance, if Jon and Adam both write content at example.com, at http://example.com/~jon/... and http://example.com/~adam/... respectively, then they could select identifiers of the form "http://example.com/~jon/name" and "http://example.com/~adam/name" respectively.

Properties whose names are just plain words can only be used within the context of the types for which they are intended; properties named using URLs can be reused in items of any type. If an item has no type, and is not part of another item, then if its properties have names that are just plain words, they are not intended to be globally unique, and are instead only intended for limited use. Generally speaking, authors are encouraged to use either properties with globally unique names (URLs) or ensure that their items are typed.

Here, an item is an "http://example.org/animals#cat", and most of the properties have names that are words defined in the context of that type. There are also a few additional properties whose names come from other vocabularies.

<section itemscope itemtype="http://example.org/animals#cat">
 <h1 itemprop="name http://example.com/fn">Hedral</h1>
 <p itemprop="desc">Hedral is a male american domestic
 shorthair, with a fluffy <span
 itemprop="http://example.com/color">black</span> fur with <span
 itemprop="http://example.com/color">white</span> paws and belly.</p>
 <img itemprop="img" src="hedral.jpeg" alt="" title="Hedral, age 18 months">
</section>

This example has one item with the type "http://example.org/animals#cat" and the following properties:

Property Value
name Hedral
http://example.com/fn Hedral
desc Hedral is a male american domestic shorthair, with a fluffy black fur with white paws and belly.
http://example.com/color black
http://example.com/color white
img .../hedral.jpeg

5.1.6 Using the microdata DOM API

This section is non-normative.

The microdata becomes even more useful when scripts can use it to expose information to the user, for example offering it in a form that can be used by other applications.

The document.getItems(typeNames) method provides access to the top-level microdata items. It returns a NodeList containing the items with the specified types, or all types if no argument is specified.

Each item is represented in the DOM by the element on which the relevant itemscope attribute is found. These elements have their element.itemScope IDL attribute set to true.

The type of items can be obtained using the element.itemType IDL attribute on the element with the itemscope attribute.

This sample shows how the getItems() method can be used to obtain a list of all the top-level microdata items of one type given in the document:

var cats = document.getItems("http://example.com/feline");

Once an element representing an item has been obtained, its properties can be extracted using the properties IDL attribute. This attribute returns an HTMLPropertiesCollection, which can be enumerated to go through each element that adds one or more properties to the item. It can also be indexed by name, which will return an object with a list of the elements that add properties with that name.

Each element that adds a property also has a itemValue IDL attribute that returns its value.

This sample gets the first item of type "http://example.net/user" and then pops up an alert using the "name" property from that item.

var user = document.getItems('http://example.net/user')[0];
alert('Hello ' + user.properties['name'][0].content + '!');

The HTMLPropertiesCollection object, when indexed by name in this way, actually returns a PropertyNodeList object with all the matching properties. The PropertyNodeList object can be used to obtain all the values at once using its values attribute, which returns an array of all the values.

In an earlier example, a "http://example.org/animals#cat" item had two "http://example.com/color" values. This script looks up the first such item and then lists all its values.

var cat = document.getItems('http://example.org/animals#cat')[0];
var colors = cat.properties['http://example.com/color'].values;
var result;
if (colors.length == 0) {
  result = 'Color unknown.';
} else if (colors.length == 1) {
  result = 'Color: ' + colors[0];
} else {
  result = 'Colors:';
  for (var i = 0; i < colors.length; i += 1)
    result += ' ' + colors[i];
}

It's also possible to get a list of all the property names using the object's names IDL attribute.

This example creates a big list with a nested list for each item on the page, each with of all the property names used in that item.

var outer = document.createElement('ul');
var items = document.getItems();
for (var item = 0; item < items.length; item += 1) {
  var itemLi = document.createElement('li');
  var inner = document.createElement('ul');
  for (var name = 0; name < items[item].properties.names.length; name += 1) {
    var propLi = document.createElement('li');
    propLi.appendChild(document.createTextNode(items[item].properties.names[name]));
    inner.appendChild(propLi);
  }
  itemLi.appendChild(inner);
  outer.appendChild(itemLi);
}
document.body.appendChild(outer);

If faced with the following from an earlier example:

<section itemscope itemtype="http://example.org/animals#cat">
 <h1 itemprop="name http://example.com/fn">Hedral</h1>
 <p itemprop="desc">Hedral is a male american domestic
 shorthair, with a fluffy <span
 itemprop="http://example.com/color">black</span> fur with <span
 itemprop="http://example.com/color">white</span> paws and belly.</p>
 <img itemprop="img" src="hedral.jpeg" alt="" title="Hedral, age 18 months">
</section>

...it would result in the following output:

(The duplicate occurrence of "http://example.com/color" is not included in the list.)

5.2 Encoding microdata

5.2.1 The microdata model

The microdata model consists of groups of name-value pairs known as items.

Each group is known as an item. Each item can have an item type, a global identifier (if the item type supports global identifiers for its items), and a list of name-value pairs. Each name in the name-value pair is known as a property, and each property has one or more values. Each value is either a string or itself a group of name-value pairs (an item).

An item is said to be a typed item when either it has an item type, or it is the value of a property of a typed item. The relevant type for a typed item is the item's item type, if it has one, or else is the relevant type of the item for which it is a property's value.

5.2.2 Items

Every HTML element may have an itemscope attribute specified. The itemscope attribute is a boolean attribute.

An element with the itemscope attribute specified creates a new item, a group of name-value pairs.


Elements with an itemscope attribute may have an itemtype attribute specified, to give the item type of the item.

The itemtype attribute, if specified, must have a value that is a valid URL that is an absolute URL for which the string "http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml/microdata#" is not a prefix match.

The item type of an item is the value of its element's itemtype attribute, if it has one and its value is not the empty string. If the itemtype attribute is missing or its value is the empty string, the item is said to have no item type.

The item type must be a type defined in an applicable specification.

Except if otherwise specified by that specification, the URL given as the item type should not be automatically dereferenced.

A specification could define that its item type can be derefenced to provide the user with help information, for example. In fact, vocabulary authors are encouraged to provide useful information at the given URL.

Item types are opaque identifiers, and user agents must not dereference unknown item types, or otherwise deconstruct them, in order to determine how to process items that use them.

The itemtype attribute must not be specified on elements that do not have an itemscope attribute specified.


Elements with an itemscope attribute and an itemtype attribute that references a vocabulary that is defined to support global identifiers for items may also have an itemid attribute specified, to give a global identifier for the item, so that it can be related to other items on pages elsewhere on the Web.

The itemid attribute, if specified, must have a value that is a valid URL.

The global identifier of an item is the value of its element's itemid attribute, if it has one, resolved relative to the element on which the attribute is specified. If the itemid attribute is missing or if resolving it fails, it is said to have no global identifier.

The itemid attribute must not be specified on elements that do not have both an itemscope attribute and an itemtype attribute specified, and must not be specified on elements with an itemscope attribute whose itemtype attribute specifies a vocabulary that does not support global identifiers for items, as defined by that vocabulary's specification.


Elements with an itemscope attribute may have an itemref attribute specified, to give a list of additional elements to crawl to find the name-value pairs of the item.

The itemref attribute, if specified, must have a value that is an unordered set of unique space-separated tokens consisting of IDs of elements in the same home subtree.

The itemref attribute must not be specified on elements that do not have an itemscope attribute specified.

5.2.3 Names: the itemprop attribute

Every HTML element may have an itemprop attribute specified, if doing so adds a property to one or more items (as defined below).

The itemprop attribute, if specified, must have a value that is an unordered set of unique space-separated tokens representing the names of the name-value pairs that it adds. The attribute's value must have at least one token.

Each token must be either:

When an element with an itemprop attribute adds a property to multiple items, the requirement above regarding the tokens applies for each item individually.

The property names of an element are the tokens that the element's itemprop attribute is found to contain when its value is split on spaces, with the order preserved but with duplicates removed (leaving only the first occurrence of each name).

Within an item, the properties are unordered with respect to each other, except for properties with the same name, which are ordered in the order they are given by the algorithm that defines the properties of an item.

In the following example, the "a" property has the values "1" and "2", in that order, but whether the "a" property comes before the "b" property or not is not important:

<div itemscope>
 <p itemprop="a">1</p>
 <p itemprop="a">2</p>
 <p itemprop="b">test</p>
</div>

Thus, the following is equivalent:

<div itemscope>
 <p itemprop="b">test</p>
 <p itemprop="a">1</p>
 <p itemprop="a">2</p>
</div>

As is the following:

<div itemscope>
 <p itemprop="a">1</p>
 <p itemprop="b">test</p>
 <p itemprop="a">2</p>
</div>

And the following:

<div itemscope itemref="x">
 <p itemprop="b">test</p>
 <p itemprop="a">2</p>
</div>
<div id="x">
 <p itemprop="a">1</p>
</div>

5.2.4 Values

The property value of a name-value pair added by an element with an itemprop attribute depends on the element, as follows:

If the element also has an itemscope attribute

The value is the item created by the element.

If the element is a meta element

The value is the value of the element's content attribute, if any, or the empty string if there is no such attribute.

If the element is an audio, embed, iframe, img, source, or video element

The value is the absolute URL that results from resolving the value of the element's src attribute relative to the element at the time the attribute is set, or the empty string if there is no such attribute or if resolving it results in an error.

If the element is an a, area, or link element

The value is the absolute URL that results from resolving the value of the element's href attribute relative to the element at the time the attribute is set, or the empty string if there is no such attribute or if resolving it results in an error.

If the element is an object element

The value is the absolute URL that results from resolving the value of the element's data attribute relative to the element at the time the attribute is set, or the empty string if there is no such attribute or if resolving it results in an error.

If the element is a time element with a datetime attribute

The value is the value of the element's datetime attribute.

Otherwise

The value is the element's textContent.

The URL property elements are the a, area, audio, embed, iframe, img, link, object, source, and video elements.

If a property's value is an absolute URL, the property must be specified using a URL property element.

If a property's value represents a date, time, or global date and time, the property must be specified using the datetime attribute of a time element.

5.2.5 Associating names with items

To find the properties of an item defined by the element root, the user agent must try to crawl the properties of the element root, with an empty list as the value of memory: if this fails, then the properties of the item defined by the element root is an empty list; otherwise, it is the returned list.

To crawl the properties of an element root with a list memory, the user agent must run the following steps:

  1. If root is in memory, then the algorithm fails; abort these steps.

  2. Collect all the elements in the item root, and let results be the result.

  3. If root is in results, then the algorithm fails; abort these steps.

  4. If any elements are listed in results more than once, then the algorithm fails; abort these steps.

  5. Remove any elements from results that do not have an itemprop attribute specified.

  6. Let new memory be a new list consisting of the old list memory with the addition of root.

  7. For each element in results that has an itemscope attribute specified, crawl the properties of the element, with new memory as the memory. If this fails, then this instance of the algorithm fails as well; abort these steps. (If it succeeds, the return value is discarded.)

  8. Sort results in tree order.

  9. Return results.

To collect all the elements in the item root, the user agent must run these steps:

  1. Let results and pending be empty lists of elements.

  2. Add all the children elements of root to pending.

  3. If root has an itemref attribute, split the value of that itemref attribute on spaces. For each resulting token ID, if there is an element in the home subtree of root with the ID ID, then add the first such element to pending.

  4. Loop: Remove an element from pending and let current be that element.

  5. Add current to results.

  6. If current does not have an itemscope attribute, then: add all the child elements of current to pending.

  7. End of loop: If pending is not empty, return to the step labeled loop.

  8. Return results.

An item is a top-level microdata item if its element does not have an itemprop attribute.

An item is a used microdata item if it is a top-level microdata item, or if it has an itemprop attribute and would be found to be the property of an item that is itself a used microdata item.

A document must not contain any items that are not used microdata items.

A document must not contain any elements that have an itemprop attribute that would not be found to be a property of any of the items in that document were their properties all to be determined.

A document must not contain any items for which crawling the properties of the element, with an empty list as the value of memory, fails.

The algorithms in this section are especially inefficient, in the interests of keeping them easy to understand. Implementors are strongly encouraged to refactor and optimize them in their user agents.

In this example, a single license statement is applied to two works, using itemref from the items representing the works:

<!DOCTYPE HTML>
<html>
 <head>
  <title>Photo gallery</title>
 </head>
 <body>
  <h1>My photos</h1>
  <figure itemscope itemtype="http://n.whatwg.org/work" itemref="licenses">
   <img itemprop="work" src="images/house.jpeg" alt="A white house, boarded up, sits in a forest.">
   <figcaption itemprop="title">The house I found.</figcaption>
  </figure>
  <figure itemscope itemtype="http://n.whatwg.org/work" itemref="licenses">
   <img itemprop="work" src="images/mailbox.jpeg" alt="Outside the house is a mailbox. It has a leaflet inside.">
   <figcaption itemprop="title">The mailbox.</figcaption>
  </figure>
  <footer>
   <p id="licenses">All images licensed under the <a itemprop="license"
   href="http://www.opensource.org/licenses/mit-license.php">MIT
   license</a>.</p>
  </footer>
 </body>
</html>

The above results in two items with the type "http://n.whatwg.org/work", one with:

work
images/house.jpeg
title
The house I found.
license
http://www.opensource.org/licenses/mit-license.php

...and one with:

work
images/mailbox.jpeg
title
The mailbox.
license
http://www.opensource.org/licenses/mit-license.php

In the following invalid example, the items are all empty, because the itemref attribute on the inner nested item indirectly references the same element twice in the same item:

<!-- invalid example - do not copy -->
<div itemscope>
 <span itemprop="example">This is <em>not</em> a property of the
 <code>div</code> element.</span>
 <p itemprop="demo" itemscope itemref="test thing"> <!-- "thing" is a descendant
                   of "test", which leads to it being included twice, which is invalid -->
  <span itemprop="sample">This isn't part of anything either.</span>
 </p>
</div>
<p id="test">
 <span id="thing">(this element is referenced twice by the
 <code>p</code> above, causing all the items that involve that
 <code>itemref=""</code> attribute to act as if they had no
 properties.)</span>
</p>

5.3 Microdata DOM API

document . getItems( [ types ] )

Returns a NodeList of the elements in the Document that create items, that are not part of other items, and that are of one of the types given in the argument, if any are listed.

The types argument is interpreted as a space-separated list of types.

element . properties

If the element has an itemscope attribute, returns an HTMLPropertiesCollection object with all the element's properties. Otherwise, an empty HTMLPropertiesCollection object.

element . itemValue [ = value ]

Returns the element's value.

Can be set, to change the element's value. Setting the value when the element has no itemprop attribute or when the element's value is an item throws an INVALID_ACCESS_ERR exception.

The document.getItems(typeNames) method takes an optional string that contains an unordered set of unique space-separated tokens representing types. When called, the method must return a live NodeList object containing all the elements in the document, in tree order, that are each top-level microdata items with a type equal to one of the types specified in that argument, having obtained the types by splitting the string on spaces. If there are no tokens specified in the argument, or if the argument is missing, then the method must return a NodeList containing all the top-level microdata items in the document. When the method is invoked on a Document object again with the same argument, the user agent may return the same object as the object returned by the earlier call. In other cases, a new NodeList object must be returned.

The itemScope IDL attribute on HTML elements must reflect the itemscope content attribute. The itemType IDL attribute on HTML elements must reflect the itemtype content attribute, as if it was a regular string attribute, not a URL string attribute. The itemId IDL attribute on HTML elements must reflect the itemid content attribute. The itemProp IDL attribute on HTML elements must reflect the itemprop content attribute. The itemRef IDL attribute on HTML elements must reflect the itemref content attribute.

The properties IDL attribute on HTML elements must return an HTMLPropertiesCollection rooted at the Document node, whose filter matches only elements that have property names and are the properties of the item created by the element on which the attribute was invoked, while that element is an item, and matches nothing the rest of the time.

The itemValue IDL attribute's behavior depends on the element, as follows:

If the element has no itemprop attribute

The attribute must return null on getting and must throw an INVALID_ACCESS_ERR exception on setting.

If the element has an itemscope attribute

The attribute must return the element itself on getting and must throw an INVALID_ACCESS_ERR exception on setting.

If the element is a meta element

The attribute must act as it would if it was reflecting the element's content content attribute.

If the element is an audio, embed, iframe, img, source, or video element

The attribute must act as it would if it was reflecting the element's src content attribute.

If the element is an a, area, or link element

The attribute must act as it would if it was reflecting the element's href content attribute.

If the element is an object element

The attribute must act as it would if it was reflecting the element's data content attribute.

If the element is a time element with a datetime attribute

The attribute must act as it would if it was reflecting the element's datetime content attribute.

Otherwise

The attribute must act the same as the element's textContent attribute.

When the itemValue IDL attribute is reflecting a content attribute or acting like the element's textContent attribute, the user agent must, on setting, convert the new value to the IDL DOMString value before using it according to the mappings described above.

In this example, a script checks to see if a particular element element is declaring a particular property, and if it is, it increments a counter:

if (element.itemProp.contains('color'))
  count += 1;

This script iterates over each of the values of an element's itemref attribute, calling a function for each referenced element:

for (var index = 0; index < element.itemRef.length; index += 1)
  process(document.getElementById(element.itemRef[index]));

5.4 Microdata vocabularies

5.4.1 vCard

An item with the item type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard represents a person's or organization's contact information.

This vocabulary supports global identifiers for items.

The following are the type's defined property names. They are based on the vocabulary defined in the vCard specification and its extensions, where more information on how to interpret the values can be found. [RFC2426] [RFC4770]

fn

Gives the formatted text corresponding to the name of the person or organization.

The value must be text.

Exactly one property with the name fn must be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

n

Gives the structured name of the person or organization.

The value must be an item with zero or more of each of the family-name, given-name, additional-name, honorific-prefix, and honorific-suffix properties.

Except when one of the conditions given below applies, exactly one property with the name n must be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

If one of the following conditions does apply, then the n may be omitted:

The item with the type vcard has both an fn property and an org property, and they both have values that are strings and those strings are identical when compared in a case-sensitive manner.

The contact information must be for an organization.

The item with the type vcard has an fn property whose value consists of a string with zero space characters.

The value of the fn property must be a nickname.

The item with the type vcard has an fn property whose value consists of a string with exactly one sequence of space characters, which occurs neither at the immediate start nor the immediate end of the string.

The value of the fn property must be a name in one of the following forms:

  • Last, First
  • Last F.
  • Last F
  • First Last
family-name (inside n)

Gives the family name of the person, or the full name of the organization.

The value must be text.

Any number of properties with the name family-name may be present within the item that forms the value of the n property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

given-name (inside n)

Gives the given-name of the person.

The value must be text.

Any number of properties with the name given-name may be present within the item that forms the value of the n property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

additional-name (inside n)

Gives the any additional names of the person.

The value must be text.

Any number of properties with the name additional-name may be present within the item that forms the value of the n property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

honorific-prefix (inside n)

Gives the honorific prefix of the person.

The value must be text.

Any number of properties with the name honorific-prefix may be present within the item that forms the value of the n property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

honorific-suffix (inside n)

Gives the honorific suffix of the person.

The value must be text.

Any number of properties with the name honorific-suffix may be present within the item that forms the value of the n property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

nickname

Gives the nickname of the person or organization.

The nickname is the descriptive name given instead of or in addition to the one belonging to a person, place, or thing. It can also be used to specify a familiar form of a proper name specified by the fn or n properties.

The value must be text.

Any number of properties with the name nickname may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

photo

Gives a photograph of the person or organization.

The value must be an absolute URL.

Any number of properties with the name photo may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

bday

Gives the birth date of the person or organization.

The value must be a valid date string.

A single property with the name bday may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

adr

Gives the delivery address of the person or organization.

The value must be an item with zero or more type, post-office-box, extended-address, and street-address properties, and optionally a locality property, optionally a region property, optionally a postal-code property, and optionally a country-name property.

If no type properties are present within an item that forms the value of an adr property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard, then the address type strings intl, postal, parcel, and work are implied.

Any number of properties with the name adr may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

type (inside adr)

Gives the type of delivery address.

The value must be text that, when compared in a case-sensitive manner, is equal to one of the address type strings.

Within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard, there must be no more than one adr property item with a type property whose value is pref.

Any number of properties with the name type may be present within the item that forms the value of an adr property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard, but within each such adr property item there must only be one type property per distinct value.

post-office-box (inside adr)

Gives the post office box component of the delivery address of the person or organization.

The value must be text.

Any number of properties with the name post-office-box may be present within the item that forms the value of an adr property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

extended-address (inside adr)

Gives an additional component of the delivery address of the person or organization.

The value must be text.

Any number of properties with the name extended-address may be present within the item that forms the value of an adr property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

street-address (inside adr)

Gives the street address component of the delivery address of the person or organization.

The value must be text.

Any number of properties with the name street-address may be present within the item that forms the value of an adr property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

locality (inside adr)

Gives the locality component (e.g. city) of the delivery address of the person or organization.

The value must be text.

A single property with the name locality may be present within the item that forms the value of an adr property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

region (inside adr)

Gives the region component (e.g. state or province) of the delivery address of the person or organization.

The value must be text.

A single property with the name region may be present within the item that forms the value of an adr property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

postal-code (inside adr)

Gives the postal code component of the delivery address of the person or organization.

The value must be text.

A single property with the name postal-code may be present within the item that forms the value of an adr property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

country-name (inside adr)

Gives the country name component of the delivery address of the person or organization.

The value must be text.

A single property with the name country-name may be present within the item that forms the value of an adr property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

label

Gives the formatted text corresponding to the delivery address of the person or organization.

The value must be either text or an item with zero or more type properties and exactly one value property.

If no type properties are present within an item that forms the value of a label property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard, or if the value of such a label property is text, then the address type strings intl, postal, parcel, and work are implied.

Any number of properties with the name label may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

type (inside label)

Gives the type of delivery address.

The value must be text that, when compared in a case-sensitive manner, is equal to one of the address type strings.

Within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard, there must be no more than one label property item with a type property whose value is pref.

Any number of properties with the name type may be present within the item that forms the value of a label property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard, but within each such label property item there must only be one type property per distinct value.

value (inside label)

Gives the actual formatted text corresponding to the delivery address of the person or organization.

The value must be text.

Exactly one property with the name value must be present within the item that forms the value of a label property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

tel

Gives the telephone number of the person or organization.

The value must be either text that can be interpreted as a telephone number as defined in the CCITT specifications E.163 and X.121, or an item with zero or more type properties and exactly one value property. [E163] [X121]

If no type properties are present within an item that forms the value of a tel property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard, or if the value of such a tel property is text, then the telephone type string voice is implied.

Any number of properties with the name tel may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

type (inside tel)

Gives the type of telephone number.

The value must be text that, when compared in a case-sensitive manner, is equal to one of the telephone type strings.

Within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard, there must be no more than one tel property item with a type property whose value is pref.

Any number of properties with the name type may be present within the item that forms the value of a tel property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard, but within each such tel property item there must only be one type property per distinct value.

value (inside tel)

Gives the actual telephone number of the person or organization.

The value must be text that can be interpreted as a telephone number as defined in the CCITT specifications E.163 and X.121. [E163] [X121]

Exactly one property with the name value must be present within the item that forms the value of a tel property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

email

Gives the e-mail address of the person or organization.

The value must be either text or an item with zero or more type properties and exactly one value property.

If no type properties are present within an item that forms the value of an email property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard, or if the value of such an email property is text, then the e-mail type string internet is implied.

Any number of properties with the name email may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

type (inside email)

Gives the type of e-mail address.

The value must be text that, when compared in a case-sensitive manner, is equal to one of the e-mail type strings.

Within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard, there must be no more than one email property item with a type property whose value is pref.

Any number of properties with the name type may be present within the item that forms the value of an email property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard, but within each such email property item there must only be one type property per distinct value.

value (inside email)

Gives the actual e-mail address of the person or organization.

The value must be text.

Exactly one property with the name value must be present within the item that forms the value of an email property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

mailer

Gives the name of the e-mail software used by the person or organization.

The value must be text.

Any number of properties with the name mailer may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

tz

Gives the time zone of the person or organization.

The value must be text and must match the following syntax:

  1. Either a U+002B PLUS SIGN character (+) or a U+002D HYPHEN-MINUS character (-).
  2. A valid non-negative integer that is exactly two digits long and that represents a number in the range 00..23.
  3. A U+003A COLON character (:).
  4. A valid non-negative integer that is exactly two digits long and that represents a number in the range 00..59.

Any number of properties with the name tz may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

geo

Gives the geographical position of the person or organization.

The value must be text and must match the following syntax:

  1. Optionally, either a U+002B PLUS SIGN character (+) or a U+002D HYPHEN-MINUS character (-).
  2. One or more digits in the range U+0030 DIGIT ZERO (0) to U+0039 DIGIT NINE (9).
  3. Optionally*, a U+002E FULL STOP character (.) followed by one or more digits in the range U+0030 DIGIT ZERO (0) to U+0039 DIGIT NINE (9).
  4. A U+003B SEMICOLON character (;).
  5. Optionally, either a U+002B PLUS SIGN character (+) or a U+002D HYPHEN-MINUS character (-).
  6. One or more digits in the range U+0030 DIGIT ZERO (0) to U+0039 DIGIT NINE (9).
  7. Optionally*, a U+002E FULL STOP character (.) followed by one or more digits in the range U+0030 DIGIT ZERO (0) to U+0039 DIGIT NINE (9).

The optional components marked with an asterisk (*) should be included, and should have six digits each.

The value specifies latitude and longitude, in that order (i.e., "LAT LON" ordering), in decimal degrees. The longitude represents the location east and west of the prime meridian as a positive or negative real number, respectively. The latitude represents the location north and south of the equator as a positive or negative real number, respectively.

Any number of properties with the name geo may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

title

Gives the job title, functional position or function of the person or organization.

The value must be text.

Any number of properties with the name title may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

role

Gives the role, occupation, or business category of the person or organization.

The value must be text.

Any number of properties with the name role may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

Gives the logo of the person or organization.

The value must be an absolute URL.

Any number of properties with the name logo may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

agent

Gives the contact information of another person who will act on behalf of the person or organization.

The value must be either an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard, or an absolute URL, or text.

Any number of properties with the name agent may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

org

Gives the name and units of the organization.

The value must be either text or an item with one organization-name property and zero or more organization-unit properties.

Any number of properties with the name org may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

organization-name (inside org)

Gives the name of the organization.

The value must be text.

Exactly one property with the name organization-name must be present within the item that forms the value of an org property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

organization-unit (inside org)

Gives the name of the organization unit.

The value must be text.

Any number of properties with the name organization-unit may be present within the item that forms the value of the org property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

categories

Gives the name of a category or tag that the person or organization could be classified as.

The value must be text.

Any number of properties with the name categories may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

note

Gives supplemental information or a comment about the person or organization.

The value must be text.

Any number of properties with the name note may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

rev

Gives the revision date and time of the contact information.

The value must be text that is a valid global date and time string.

The value distinguishes the current revision of the information for other renditions of the information.

Any number of properties with the name rev may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

sort-string

Gives the string to be used for sorting the person or organization.

The value must be text.

Any number of properties with the name sort-string may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

sound

Gives a sound file relating to the person or organization.

The value must be an absolute URL.

Any number of properties with the name sound may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

url

Gives a URL relating to the person or organization.

The value must be an absolute URL.

Any number of properties with the name url may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

class

Gives the access classification of the information regarding the person or organization.

The value must be text with one of the following values:

This is merely advisory and cannot be considered a confidentiality measure.

Any number of properties with the name class may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

impp

Gives a URL for instant messaging and presence protocol communications with the person or organization.

The value must be either an absolute URL or an item with zero or more type properties and exactly one value property.

If no type properties are present within an item that forms the value of an impp property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard, or if the value of such an impp property is an absolute URL, then no IMPP type strings are implied.

Any number of properties with the name impp may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

type (inside impp)

Gives the intended use of the IMPP URL.

The value must be text that, when compared in a case-sensitive manner, is equal to one of the IMPP type strings.

Within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard, there must be no more than one impp property item with a type property whose value is pref.

Any number of properties with the name type may be present within the item that forms the value of an impp property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard, but within each such impp property item there must only be one type property per distinct value.

value (inside impp)

Gives the actual URL for instant messaging and presence protocol communications with the person or organization.

The value must be an absolute URL.

Exactly one property with the name value must be present within the item that forms the value of an impp property of an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

The address type strings are:

dom

Indicates a domestic delivery address.

intl

Indicates an international delivery address.

postal

Indicates a postal delivery address.

parcel

Indicates a parcel delivery address.

home

Indicates a residential delivery address.

work

Indicates a delivery address for a place of work.

pref

Indicates the preferred delivery address when multiple addresses are specified.

The telephone type strings are:

home

Indicates a residential number.

msg

Indicates a telephone number with voice messaging support.

work

Indicates a telephone number for a place of work.

voice

Indicates a voice telephone number.

fax

Indicates a facsimile telephone number.

cell

Indicates a cellular telephone number.

video

Indicates a video conferencing telephone number.

pager

Indicates a paging device telephone number.

bbs

Indicates a bulletin board system telephone number.

modem

Indicates a MODEM-connected telephone number.

car

Indicates a car-phone telephone number.

isdn

Indicates an ISDN service telephone number.

pcs

Indicates a personal communication services telephone number.

pref

Indicates the preferred telephone number when multiple telephone numbers are specified.

The e-mail type strings are:

internet

Indicates an Internet e-mail address.

x400

Indicates a X.400 addressing type.

pref

Indicates the preferred e-mail address when multiple e-mail addresses are specified.

The IMPP type strings are:

personal
business

Indicates the type of communication for which this IMPP URL is appropriate.

home
work
mobile

Indicates the location of a device associated with this IMPP URL.

pref

Indicates the preferred address when multiple IMPP URLs are specified.

5.4.1.1 Conversion to vCard

Given a list of nodes nodes in a Document, a user agent must run the following algorithm to extract any vCard data represented by those nodes (only the first vCard is returned):

  1. If none of the nodes in nodes are items with the item type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard, then there is no vCard. Abort the algorithm, returning nothing.

  2. Let node be the first node in nodes that is an item with the item type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard.

  3. Let output be an empty string.

  4. Add a vCard line with the type "BEGIN" and the value "VCARD" to output.

  5. Add a vCard line with the type "PROFILE" and the value "VCARD" to output.

  6. Add a vCard line with the type "VERSION" and the value "3.0" to output.

  7. Add a vCard line with the type "SOURCE" and the result of escaping the vCard text string that is the document's current address as the value to output.

  8. If the title element is not null, add a vCard line with the type "NAME" and with the result of escaping the vCard text string obtained from the textContent of the title element as the value to output.

  9. If node has a global identifier, add a vCard line with the type "UID" and with the result of escaping the vCard text string of that global identifier as the value to output.

  10. Let first-n, first-org, and first-fn be null.

  11. For each element element that is a property of the item node: for each name name in element's property names, run the following substeps:

    1. Let parameters be an empty set of name-value pairs.

    2. Run the appropriate set of substeps from the following list. The steps will set a variable value, which is used in the next step.

      If the property's value is an item subitem and name is n
      1. If first-n is null, let first-n be element.

      2. Let value be the empty string.

      3. Append to value the result of collecting the first vCard subproperty named family-name in subitem.

      4. Append a U+003B SEMICOLON character (;) to value.
      5. Append to value the result of collecting the first vCard subproperty named given-name in subitem.

      6. Append a U+003B SEMICOLON character (;) to value.
      7. Append to value the result of collecting the first vCard subproperty named additional-name in subitem.

      8. Append a U+003B SEMICOLON character (;) to value.
      9. Append to value the result of collecting the first vCard subproperty named honorific-prefix in subitem.

      10. Append a U+003B SEMICOLON character (;) to value.
      11. Append to value the result of collecting the first vCard subproperty named honorific-suffix in subitem.

      If the property's value is an item subitem and name is adr
      1. Let value be the empty string.

      2. Append to value the result of collecting vCard subproperties named post-office-box in subitem.

      3. Append a U+003B SEMICOLON character (;) to value.
      4. Append to value the result of collecting vCard subproperties named extended-address in subitem.

      5. Append a U+003B SEMICOLON character (;) to value.
      6. Append to value the result of collecting vCard subproperties named street-address in subitem.

      7. Append a U+003B SEMICOLON character (;) to value.
      8. Append to value the result of collecting the first vCard subproperty named locality in subitem.

      9. Append a U+003B SEMICOLON character (;) to value.
      10. Append to value the result of collecting the first vCard subproperty named region in subitem.

      11. Append a U+003B SEMICOLON character (;) to value.
      12. Append to value the result of collecting the first vCard subproperty named postal-code in subitem.

      13. Append a U+003B SEMICOLON character (;) to value.
      14. Append to value the result of collecting the first vCard subproperty named country-name in subitem.

      15. If there is a property named type in subitem, and the first such property has a value that is not an item and whose value consists only of alphanumeric ASCII characters, then add a parameter named "TYPE" whose value is the value of that property to parameters.

      If the property's value is an item subitem and name is org
      1. If first-org is null, let first-org be element.

      2. Let value be the empty string.

      3. Append to value the result of collecting the first vCard subproperty named organization-name in subitem.

      4. For each property named organization-unit in subitem, run the following steps:

        1. If the value of the property is an item, then skip this property.

        2. Append a U+003B SEMICOLON character (;) to value.

        3. Append the result of escaping the vCard text string given by the value of the property to value.

      If the property's value is an item subitem with the item type http://microformats.org/profile/hcard and name is agent
      1. Let value be the result of escaping the vCard text string obtained from extracting a vCard from the element that represents subitem.

      2. Add a parameter named "VALUE" whose value is "VCARD" to parameters.

      If the property's value is an item and name is none of the above
      1. Let value be the result of collecting the first vCard subproperty named value in subitem.

      2. If there is a property named type in subitem, and the first such property has a value that is not an item and whose value consists only of alphanumeric ASCII characters, then add a parameter named "TYPE" whose value is the value of that property to parameters.

      Otherwise (the property's value is not an item)
      1. If name is fn and first-fn is null, let first-fn be element.

        Otherwise, if name is org and first-org is null, let first-org be element.

      2. Let value be the property's value.

      3. If element is one of the URL property elements, add a parameter with the name "VALUE" and the value "URI" to parameters.

      4. Otherwise, if element is a time element and the value is a valid date string, add a parameter with the name "VALUE" and the value "DATE" to parameters.

      5. Otherwise, if element is a time element and the value is a valid global date and time string, add a parameter with the name "VALUE" and the value "DATE-TIME" to parameters.

      6. Prefix every U+005C REVERSE SOLIDUS character (\) in value with another U+005C REVERSE SOLIDUS character (\).

      7. Prefix every U+002C COMMA character (,) in value with a U+005C REVERSE SOLIDUS character (\).

      8. Unless name is geo, prefix every U+003B SEMICOLON character (;) in value with a U+005C REVERSE SOLIDUS character (\).

      9. Replace every U+000D CARRIAGE RETURN U+000A LINE FEED character pair (CRLF) in value with a U+005C REVERSE SOLIDUS character (\) followed by a U+006E LATIN SMALL LETTER N character (n).

      10. Replace every remaining U+000D CARRIAGE RETURN (CR) or U+000A LINE FEED (LF) character in value with a U+005C REVERSE SOLIDUS character (\) followed by a U+006E LATIN SMALL LETTER N character (n).

    3. Add a vCard line with the type name, the parameters parameters, and the value value to output.

  12. If first-n is null, then run the following substeps:

    1. If first-fn is also null, then skip the remainder of these substeps.

    2. If first-fn has a value that is an item, then skip the remainder of these substeps.

    3. If first-org is not null, and the value of first-org is not an item and is equal to first-fn, then add a vCard line with the type "N" whose value is four U+003B SEMICOLON characters (";;;;") to output. Then, skip the remainder of these substeps.

    4. If the space characters in first-fn, if any, are not all contiguous, then skip the remainder of these substeps.

    5. Split first-fn on spaces, and let part one be the first resulting token, and part two be the second, if any, or the empty string if there is no second token. (There cannot be three, given the previous step.)

    6. If the last character of part one is a U+002C COMMA character (,), then remove that character from part one and add a vCard line with the type "N" whose value is the concatenation of the following strings:

      1. The result of escaping the vCard text string part one
      2. A U+003B SEMICOLON character (;)
      3. The result of escaping the vCard text string part two
      4. Three U+003B SEMICOLON characters (;)

      Then, skip the remainder of these substeps.

    7. If part two is two Unicode code-points long and its second character is a U+002E FULL STOP character (.), then add a vCard line with the type "N" whose value is the concatenation of the following strings:

      1. The result of escaping the vCard text string part one
      2. A U+003B SEMICOLON character (;)
      3. The result of escaping the vCard text string consisting of the first character of part two
      4. Three U+003B SEMICOLON characters (;)

      Then, skip the remainder of these substeps.

    8. If part two is one Unicode code-point long, then add a vCard line with the type "N" whose value is the concatenation of the following strings:

      1. The result of escaping the vCard text string part one
      2. A U+003B SEMICOLON character (;)
      3. The result of escaping the vCard text string part two
      4. Three U+003B SEMICOLON characters (;)

      Then, skip the remainder of these substeps.

    9. Add a vCard line with the type "N" whose value is the concatenation of the following strings:

      1. The result of escaping the vCard text string part two
      2. A U+003B SEMICOLON character (;)
      3. The result of escaping the vCard text string part one
      4. Three U+003B SEMICOLON characters (;)
  13. Add a vCard line with the type "END" and the value "VCARD" to output.

When the above algorithm says that the user agent is to add a vCard line consisting of a type type, optionally some parameters, and a value value to a string output, it must run the following steps:

  1. Let line be an empty string.

  2. Append type, converted to ASCII uppercase, to line.

  3. If there are any parameters, then for each parameter, in the order that they were added, run these substeps:

    1. Append a U+003B SEMICOLON character (;) to line.

    2. Append the parameter's name to line.

    3. Append a U+003D EQUALS SIGN character (=) to line.

    4. Append the parameter's value to line.

  4. Append a U+003A COLON character (:) to line.

  5. Append value to line.

  6. Let maximum length be 75.

  7. If and while line is longer than maximum length Unicode code points long, run the following substeps:

    1. Append the first maximum length Unicode code points of line to output.

    2. Remove the first maximum length Unicode code points from line.

    3. Append a U+000D CARRIAGE RETURN character (CR) to output.

    4. Append a U+000A LINE FEED character (LF) to output.

    5. Append a U+0020 SPACE character to output.

    6. Let maximum length be 74.

  8. Append (what remains of) line to output.

  9. Append a U+000D CARRIAGE RETURN character (CR) to output.

  10. Append a U+000A LINE FEED character (LF) to output.

When the steps above require the user agent to obtain the result of collecting vCard subproperties named subname in subitem, the user agent must run the following steps:

  1. Let value be the empty string.

  2. For each property named subname in the item subitem, run the following substeps:

    1. If the value of the property is itself an item, then skip this property.

    2. If this is not the first property named subname in subitem (ignoring any that were skipped by the previous step), then append a U+002C COMMA character (,) to value.

    3. Append the result of escaping the vCard text string given by the value of the property to value.

  3. Return value.

When the steps above require the user agent to obtain the result of collecting the first vCard subproperty named subname in subitem, the user agent must run the following steps:

  1. If there are no properties named subname in subitem, then abort these substeps, returning the empty string.

  2. If the value of the first property named subname in subitem is an item, then abort these substeps, returning the empty string.

  3. Return the result of escaping the vCard text string given by the value of the first property named subname in subitem.

When the above algorithms say the user agent is to escape the vCard text string value, the user agent must use the following steps:

  1. Prefix every U+005C REVERSE SOLIDUS character (\) in value with another U+005C REVERSE SOLIDUS character (\).

  2. Prefix every U+002C COMMA character (,) in value with a U+005C REVERSE SOLIDUS character (\).

  3. Prefix every U+003B SEMICOLON character (;) in value with a U+005C REVERSE SOLIDUS character (\).

  4. Replace every U+000D CARRIAGE RETURN U+000A LINE FEED character pair (CRLF) in value with a U+005C REVERSE SOLIDUS character (\) followed by a U+006E LATIN SMALL LETTER N character (n).

  5. Replace every remaining U+000D CARRIAGE RETURN (CR) or U+000A LINE FEED (LF) character in value with a U+005C REVERSE SOLIDUS character (\) followed by a U+006E LATIN SMALL LETTER N character (n).

  6. Return the mutated value.

This algorithm can generate invalid vCard output, if the input does not conform to the rules described for the http://microformats.org/profile/hcard item type and defined property names.

5.4.1.2 Examples

This section is non-normative.

Here is a long example vCard for a fictional character called "Jack Bauer":

<section id="jack" itemscope itemtype="http://microformats.org/profile/hcard">
 <h1 itemprop="fn">Jack Bauer</h1>
 <img itemprop="photo" alt="" src="jack-bauer.jpg">
 <p itemprop="org" itemscope>
  <span itemprop="organization-name">Counter-Terrorist Unit</span>
  (<span itemprop="organization-unit">Los Angeles Division</span>)
 </p>
 <p>
  <span itemprop="adr" itemscope>
   <span itemprop="street-address">10201 W. Pico Blvd.</span><br>
   <span itemprop="locality">Los Angeles</span>,
   <span itemprop="region">CA</span>
   <span itemprop="postal-code">90064</span><br>
   <span itemprop="country-name">United States</span><br>
  </span>
  <span itemprop="geo">34.052339;-118.410623</span>
 </p>
 <h2>Assorted Contact Methods</h2>
 <ul>
  <li itemprop="tel" itemscope>
   <span itemprop="value">+1 (310) 597 3781</span> <span itemprop="type">work</span>
   <meta itemprop="type" content="pref">
  </li>
  <li><a itemprop="url" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Bauer">I'm on Wikipedia</a>
  so you can leave a message on my user talk page.</li>
  <li><a itemprop="url" href="http://www.jackbauerfacts.com/">Jack Bauer Facts</a></li>
  <li itemprop="email"><a href="mailto:j.bauer@la.ctu.gov.invalid">j.bauer@la.ctu.gov.invalid</a></li>
  <li itemprop="tel" itemscope>
   <span itemprop="value">+1 (310) 555 3781</span> <span>
   <meta itemprop="type" content="cell">mobile phone</span>
  </li>
 </ul>
 <p itemprop="note">If I'm out in the field, you may be better off contacting <span
 itemprop="agent" itemscope itemtype="http://microformats.org/profile/hcard"><a
 itemprop="email" href="mailto:c.obrian@la.ctu.gov.invalid"><span
 itemprop="fn">Chloe O'Brian</span></a></span> if it's about work, or ask <span
 itemprop="agent">Tony Almeida</span> if you're interested in the CTU five-a-side football team we're trying to get going.</p>
 <ins datetime="2008-07-20T21:00:00+01:00">
  <span itemprop="rev" itemscope>
   <meta itemprop="type" content="date-time">
   <meta itemprop="value" content="2008-07-20T21:00:00+01:00">
  </span>
  <p itemprop="tel" itemscope><strong>Update!</strong>
  My new <span itemprop="type">home</span> phone number is
  <span itemprop="value">01632 960 123</span>.</p>
 </ins>
</section>

The odd line wrapping is needed because newlines are meaningful in microdata: newlines would be preserved in a conversion to, for example, the vCard format.

This example shows a site's contact details (using the address element) containing an address with two street components:

<address itemscope itemtype="http://microformats.org/profile/hcard">
 <strong itemprop="fn">Alfred Person</strong> <br>
 <span itemprop="adr" itemscope>
  <span itemprop="street-address">1600 Amphitheatre Parkway</span> <br>
  <span itemprop="street-address">Building 43, Second Floor</span> <br>
  <span itemprop="locality">Mountain View</span>,
   <span itemprop="region">CA</span> <span itemprop="postal-code">94043</span>
 </span>
</address>

The vCard vocabulary can be used to just mark up people's names:

<span itemscope itemtype="http://microformats.org/profile/hcard"
><span itemprop=fn>George Washington</span></span>

This creates a single item with a single name-value pair, with the name "fn" and the value "George Washington". This is defined to map to the following vCard:

BEGIN:VCARD
PROFILE:VCARD
VERSION:3.0
SOURCE:document's address
FN:George Washington
N:Washington;George;;;
END:VCARD

5.4.2 vEvent

An item with the item type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent represents an event.

This vocabulary supports global identifiers for items.

The following are the type's defined property names. They are based on the vocabulary defined in the iCalendar specification, where more information on how to interpret the values can be found. [RFC2445]

Only the parts of the iCalendar vocabulary relating to events are used here; this vocabulary cannot express a complete iCalendar instance.

attach

Gives the address of an associated document for the event.

The value must be an absolute URL.

Any number of properties with the name attach may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.

categories

Gives the name of a category or tag that the event could be classified as.

The value must be text.

Any number of properties with the name categories may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.

class

Gives the access classification of the information regarding the event.

The value must be text with one of the following values:

This is merely advisory and cannot be considered a confidentiality measure.

A single property with the name class may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.

comment

Gives a comment regarding the event.

The value must be text.

Any number of properties with the name comment may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.

description

Gives a detailed description of the event.

The value must be text.

A single property with the name description may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.

geo

Gives the geographical position of the event.

The value must be text and must match the following syntax:

  1. Optionally, either a U+002B PLUS SIGN character (+) or a U+002D HYPHEN-MINUS character (-).
  2. One or more digits in the range U+0030 DIGIT ZERO (0) to U+0039 DIGIT NINE (9).
  3. Optionally*, a U+002E FULL STOP character (.) followed by one or more digits in the range U+0030 DIGIT ZERO (0) to U+0039 DIGIT NINE (9).
  4. A U+003B SEMICOLON character (;).
  5. Optionally, either a U+002B PLUS SIGN character (+) or a U+002D HYPHEN-MINUS character (-).
  6. One or more digits in the range U+0030 DIGIT ZERO (0) to U+0039 DIGIT NINE (9).
  7. Optionally*, a U+002E FULL STOP character (.) followed by one or more digits in the range U+0030 DIGIT ZERO (0) to U+0039 DIGIT NINE (9).

The optional components marked with an asterisk (*) should be included, and should have six digits each.

The value specifies latitude and longitude, in that order (i.e., "LAT LON" ordering), in decimal degrees. The longitude represents the location east and west of the prime meridian as a positive or negative real number, respectively. The latitude represents the location north and south of the equator as a positive or negative real number, respectively.

A single property with the name geo may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.

location

Gives the location of the event.

The value must be text.

A single property with the name location may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.

resources

Gives a resource that will be needed for the event.

The value must be text.

Any number of properties with the name resources may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.

status

Gives the confirmation status of the event.

The value must be text with one of the following values:

A single property with the name status may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.

summary

Gives a short summary of the event.

The value must be text.

User agents should replace U+000A LINE FEED (LF) characters in the value by U+0020 SPACE characters when using the value.

A single property with the name summary may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.

dtend

Gives the date and time by which the event ends.

If the property with the name dtend is present within an item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent that has a property with the name dtstart whose value is a valid date string, then the value of the property with the name dtend must be text that is a valid date string also. Otherwise, the value of the property must be text that is a valid global date and time string.

In either case, the value be later in time than the value of the dtstart property of the same item.

The time given by the dtend property is not inclusive. For day-long events, therefore, the dtend property's value will be the day after the end of the event.

A single property with the name dtend may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent, so long as that http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent does not have a property with the name duration.

dtstart

Gives the date and time at which the event starts.

The value must be text that is either a valid date string or a valid global date and time string.

Exactly one property with the name dtstart must be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.

duration

Gives the date and time at which the event starts.

The value must be text that is a valid vevent duration string.

The duration represented is the sum of all the durations represented by integers in the value.

A single property with the name duration may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent, so long as that http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent does not have a property with the name dtend.

transp

Gives whether the event is to be considered as consuming time on a calendar, for the purpose of free-busy time searches.

The value must be text with one of the following values:

A single property with the name transp may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.

contact

Gives the contact information for the event.

The value must be text.

Any number of properties with the name contact may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.

url

Gives a URL for the event.

The value must be an absolute URL.

A single property with the name url may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.

exdate

Gives a date and time at which the event does not occur despite the recurrence rules.

The value must be text that is either a valid date string or a valid global date and time string.

Any number of properties with the name exdate may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.

exrule

Gives a rule for finding dates and times at which the event does not occur despite the recurrence rules.

The value must be text that matches the RECUR value type defined in the iCalendar specification. [RFC2445]

Any number of properties with the name exrule may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.

rdate

Gives a date and time at which the event recurs.

The value must be text that is one of the following:

Any number of properties with the name rdate may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.

rrule

Gives a rule for finding dates and times at which the event occurs.

The value must be text that matches the RECUR value type defined in the iCalendar specification. [RFC2445]

Any number of properties with the name rrule may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.

created

Gives the date and time at which the event information was first created in a calendaring system.

The value must be text that is a valid global date and time string.

A single property with the name created may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.

last-modified

Gives the date and time at which the event information was last modified in a calendaring system.

The value must be text that is a valid global date and time string.

A single property with the name last-modified may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.

sequence

Gives a revision number for the event information.

The value must be text that is a valid non-negative integer.

A single property with the name sequence may be present within each item with the type http://microformats.org/profile/hcalendar#vevent.