I've written this out as a plain XML standard that does not use RDF. It's trivial XML that should be easy to parse. Arguably RDF would be a better choice but there's a big trade off here between power and ease of adoption. If RDF is used and the standard is extended dramatically, but each extension is not widely used, we're right back where we started from.
It's important that as the versions progress, old elements are still supported, from the point that implementations begin to appear.
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1" ?> //standard XML header
<rscml version="0.1"> //defines the version level of this feed
<channel>
//A single feed. Multiple <channels> could be concatenated into one feed
<title></title>
//required. A one line name for this channel
<link></link>
//required. The URL of the owning website. Ideally the web page that describes the RSCML feed.
<url></url>
//required. The recommended URL of this RSCML feed.
<webmaster></webmaster>
//required. The email address of a contact at the owning website.
<description></description>
//optional. A short description of this channel.
<rec collection frequency></rec collection frequency>
//optional. The likely frequency of updates in seconds. Gives a guide to how often readers should check for updates.
<last modified date></last modified date>
//optional. The date in ISO standard format
<uddi id></uddi id>
//optional. A UDDI ID for this organization
<category url=></category>
//optional. A category in which to place this feed with the URL of a category standard that this is taken from. eg UNSPC
<image>
<link></link>
<width></width>
<height></height>
<alt></alt>
</image>
//optional. A link to a small image file that can be used by the reader when the RSCML data is displayed.
<product>
//Multiple. One <product></product> entry for each unique product by ID and Manufacturer
<deleted />
//Optional. If present marks the <product> as no longer available.
<ID></ID>
//Required. A unique product identifier. Probably the manufacturer's id number
<title></title>
//required. A one line name for this product.
<abstract></abstract>
//optional. A short description of this product.
<manufacturer></manufacturer>
//optional. A one line name for the manufacturer.
<link></link>
//optional. The URL for the web page that describes this product.
<category url=></category>
//optional. A category in which to place this feed with the URL of a category standard that this is taken from. eg UNSPC
<attribute>
<name></name>
<value></value>
</attribute>
//Optional, Multiple. Name value pairs of whatever attributes may be needed to describe the product.
</product>
</channel>
</rscml>
Note that all strings are assumed to be CDATA and should be character encoded.
Generally, strings should be allowed to contain html as long as this is also entity encoded so that the feed remains valid html. |
