Microformats and forms

Hi,

My head is spinning from reading too much of the website at
once so forgive me if I've missed the obvious.

The "Microformats in REST Web Services" page
appears to concern the use of microformats to describe a web
service.

Has it been considered whether microformats could also be
used with forms to allow a user to enter structured data
automatically?

e.g. this site needs my address details but luckily my
browser has spotted their form will accept my hcard.

Chris

BTW I hate filling in forms 

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> e.g. this site needs my address details but luckily my
browser has spotted their form will accept my hcard.

Hi Chris, that's an interesting application idea but I think
the idea
behind a microformat is to describe content in the HTML
document in a
standardized format (based on common usage elsewhere such as
vCard)
rather than store it externally (for use by the browser to
populate a
form).

A.
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Hi
> Hi Chris, that's an interesting application idea but I
think the idea
> behind a microformat is to describe content in the HTML
document in a
> standardized format (based on common usage elsewhere
such as vCard)
> rather than store it externally (for use by the browser
to populate a
> form).

I dont think this is the point, Chris wanted to focus on.
If there would be a standarized format how to descripe form
elements
it would help developers of extentions, plugins and
useragents to
automatically prefill it. (Instead of just guessing if its
possibly a
login-field).

There are two examples, which come in my mind:

a) to solve the problems, several screenreaders get by
   "displaying" form fields. E.g. yaws form-mode.
b) to add site search engines to the browsers search bar
without
   the need of javascript or an index like http://mycroft.mozdev.org/



Regards,
  Wolfgang
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"Ara Pehlivanian" <ara.pehlivaniangmail.com> writes:

>> e.g. this site needs my address details but luckily
my browser has spotted their form will accept my hcard.
>
> Hi Chris, that's an interesting application idea but I
think the idea
> behind a microformat is to describe content in the HTML
document in a
> standardized format (based on common usage elsewhere
such as vCard)
> rather than store it externally (for use by the browser
to populate a
> form).

Surely there is scope for tying form parameters to
microformat
descriptions?

If I want to recieve an address I might put input parameters
for:

   street
   address
   town
   postcode

but if the form was marked to recieve an hcard then it could
be
automatically populated by the browser (or greasemonkey, or
whatever).


-- 
Nic Ferrier
http://www.tapsellfer
rier.co.uk   for all your tapsell ferrier needs
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> I dont think this is the point, Chris wanted to focus
on.
> If there would be a standarized format how to descripe
form elements
> it would help developers of extentions, plugins and
useragents to
> automatically prefill it. (Instead of just guessing if
its possibly a
> login-field).
>
> There are two examples, which come in my mind:
>
> a) to solve the problems, several screenreaders get by
>    "displaying" form fields. E.g. yaws
form-mode.
> b) to add site search engines to the browsers search
bar without
>    the need of javascript or an index like http://mycroft.mozdev.org/


Wolfgang, I see your point. I misunderstood because of the
whole
"receiving an hCard" part. I'm still not certain
as to how that part
applies, but I see what you/he means in regards to
standardized form
fields. That does make a lot of sense.

Cheers,
A.
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On Jan 25, 2007, at 10:04 AM, Ara Pehlivanian wrote:
> Wolfgang, I see your point. I misunderstood because of
the whole
> "receiving an hCard" part. I'm still not
certain as to how that part
> applies, but I see what you/he means in regards to
standardized form
> fields. That does make a lot of sense.

The Live Clipboard (http://www.liveclipboar
d.org/) stuff seems to be  
a step in the direction of letting forms consume
microformats. I  
haven't looked at it recently.

--
Jonathan Williams
NYU Steinhardt
jonathan.williamsnyu.edu
+1 212 998 5308


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I can't help but consider the security implications here,
password
managers have been giving the browser developers hell this
whole last
year, in attempting to determine what forms are safe to
submit private
data to, and which are not.  This kind of "here's my
hCard"
exclamation seems nice in theory (and would probably be
great for
people trying to broadcast their personal information) but
it strikes
me as an excellent way for anyone to steal your personal
data and
collect your information.

~ Anders

On 1/25/07, Chris Newell <chris.newellrd.bbc.co.uk> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> My head is spinning from reading too much of the
website at once so forgive me if I've missed the obvious.
>
> The "Microformats in REST Web Services" page
appears to concern the use of microformats to describe a web
service.
>
> Has it been considered whether microformats could also
be used with forms to allow a user to enter structured data
automatically?
>
> e.g. this site needs my address details but luckily my
browser has spotted their form will accept my hcard.
>
> Chris
>
> BTW I hate filling in forms 
>
> _______________________________________________
> microformats-discuss mailing list
> microformats-discussmicroformats.org
> http://microformats.org/mailman/listinfo/microforma
ts-discuss
>
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On 25/01/07, Jonathan C Williams <jonathan.williamsnyu.edu> wrote:
>
> The Live Clipboard (http://www.liveclipboar
d.org/) stuff seems to be
> a step in the direction of letting forms consume
microformats. I
> haven't looked at it recently.
>
I've spent a couple of hours this afternoon getting the
contact page
on the website I'm working on to accept hCards through
LiveClipboard:

http://www.serviceworksglobal.com/demo/pages/contact
-us.html

It seems to work OK, I can copy an hCard from the
LiveClipboard demo
[1] and use it to populate the form in IE.  I can also pick
up hCards
with Operator and use them to populate the form, though
Operator seems
to lose the email address.  Trying to paste invalid or empty
data in
seems to kill it until page reload, so I probably need to
add some
checking in somewhere.

I took the code from the 'Tech Preview' [2] page and hacked
it around
without any great attempt to understand how it worked, so
the 78k
javascript file I ended up with through the 'copy and
paste'
development technique could be greatly reduced (I'm only
really
interested in the paste functionality, after all).  Also,
it's leaving
a lot of unnecessary crud in the page at the minute because
I couldn't
work out how to do without the contactHcard1 div, so I took
the easy
way out and hid it.

Rob

[1] http://spaces.live.c
om/editorial/rayozzie/demo/liveclip/liveclipsample/clipboard
example.html
[2] http://spaces.live.com/ed
itorial/rayozzie/demo/liveclip/liveclipsample/techPreview.ht
ml
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