*UK LOM Core, vCard (summary)*
The following is a summary of discussion on the CETIS-Metadata list, and
will hopefully serve as the agreed starting point for further discussion at
the UK LOM Core meeting in Glasgow. The archives of the original discussion
can be found at http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/cetis-metadata.html (the
discussion took place in July).
*Position in UK LOM Core draft 2*
As in the LOM, vCard is used to describe entities who/which have played a
part in the production of the resource being described or the metadata
record. It is clear that sometimes the entity will be a corporate body (a
project or an institution).
*Issue Description*
Andy Powell wrote (at 16:50 on Fri 9 Jul, subject: UK LOM Core: vCard)
"strict interpretation of the vCard spec means that we can *only* use vCard
to provide information about people. We can not use it for organisations."
In particular vCard mandates that N and FN attributes (which are commonly
used for personal names) should appear in every vCard.
There was a lot of discussion around the pros and cons of ignoring the
mandatory elements, providing null values or some value to indicate that
there was no suitable value, or providing values which were as close to the
vCard spec as possible.
It appears that no one is unhappy with the solution proposed by Chris
Hubick, summarised by Andy Powell (at 11:49 on Wed 28 Jul, subject: Re: UK
LOM Core: vCard):
"when creating a vCard for an organisation we should
- place the name into FN
- place the name into the 'additional names' component of N, leaving all
other components blank
- place the name into ORG
e.g.
<![CDATA[BEGIN:VCARD
FN:University of Oxford
N:;;University of Oxford
ORG:University of Oxford
VERSION:3.0
END:VCARD]]>
Conversely, for parsers the rule is
- if ORG == FN == additional names component of N, then the vCard
represents an organisation
"
*Routes to Resolution?*
Ratify the suggestion above.
Other suggestions? (Please read the full discussion before re-opening this
issue!)
Phil.
--
Phil Barker Learning Technology Adviser
ICBL, School of Mathematical and Computer Sciences
Mountbatten Building, Heriot-Watt University,
Edinburgh, EH14 4AS
Tel: 0131 451 3278 Fax: 0131 451 3327
Web: http://www.icbl.hw.ac.uk/~philb/
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