On Thu, Jul 2, 2015 at 4:37 AM, Tantek Çelik <tan...@cs.stanford.edu> wrote:
> > > Schema.org also provides existing schemas for actions associated with > items > > (https://schema.org/docs/actions.html), > > ... > > Currently the IndieWeb community is pursuing Web Actions (and has them > working across sites) > > http://indiewebcamp.com/webactions TL;DR WebActions, as presented in [1], are not sufficiently well developed for us to base an implementation upon. With lots of additional work, they could one day form the basis of an implementation, but, as a target for FirefoxOS 2.5, they are simply not there yet. !(TL;DR) I am uneasy about going in too much detail about each point as I feel that doing so will be a waste of my time and yours. So, I'll try to keep it short. The WebActions referred to in [1] have many problems which need to be addressed before they enter general usage: - They are not well defined - They are not well defined enough to compute over - There is no well defined means of extension - There is no active community - There is no means to specify action parameters - The vocabulary of current actions is not sufficient to do anything now - ... They are not well defined - The main <indie-action> tag is used "to wrap any third party/silo action buttons/links". What exactly is a "third party action"? Are schema.org actions supported? If so, how does the schema.org "target" attribute interact with the <indie-action> "with" attribute? If schema.org actions are not supported, what "third party actions" are? Explicitly, how do the URL templates, say, of such unspecified "third party actions" interact with the <indie-action> "with" attribute?....Basically, this document[1] needs much work before it can be said to define an <indie-action>. They are not well defined enough to compute over - Assume a dailer web app presents a <indie-action> tag corresponding to a "dial" action. (This is a simple use case that we have to be able to handle. This is not an edge case.) Assume further that there was a well defined means of adding actions so such an action could even exist. Does the <indie-action> tag for the dial action contain a URL for every possible number it can dial? (The description of [1] never uses anything like URL templates. So, this seems to imply that only non-template URL's are allowed.) Assuming that this was a mistake in the description of [1] and URL templates are allowed, how does one specify the type of a URL template argument. In other words, could I pass "fldska" as a telephone number? This is never touched upon....Again, it's obvious here that much work is needed before the document[1] can be said to define an <indie-action> that is able to be computed over. There is no well defined means of extension - How do I add a new action? This is not mentioned. (There is mention made of one possible new verb "tip"[2], but no detail is given on its meaning. It's only stated "tip - for Flattr, Gittip buttons and maybe other payment providers.") Mention is made that "we can create a common verb registry like the rel registry", but no registry is ever presented nor is the means to register in such a registry if it even existed. Again, this needs lots of work which hasn't been done. There is no active community - The last entry in the History section of [1] is from 2012. In contrast, the last entry in the schema.org github repository[3] is from yesterday. There is no means to specify action parameters - There is no mention of how an action is parameterized. Again, a simple example. For a dailer web app that exposes the dialing web action to dial an arbitrary phone number. How is this dail action exposed with WebActions? There is no specification or discussion of how this would occur. We can't possibly have a fixed URL for all possible numbers; there has to be some type of URL template that one can specify. There is no mention made of this. Again, this needs work. The vocabulary of current actions is not sufficient to do anything now - The only actions that exist now are post, reply, repost, and like (and maybe tip), and there is no official means to add new actions. So, what if we wanted a dial action? Currently this is impossible. With the current limited vocabulary and no means to add new actions, WebActions is a non-starter for my use cases and those of Taipei. .... TL;DR: WebActions, as presented in [1], are not sufficiently well developed for us to base an implementation upon. With lots of additional work, they could one day form the basis of an implementation, but, as a target for FirefoxOS 2.5, they are simply not there yet. [1] http://indiewebcamp.com/webactions [2] http://indiewebcamp.com/webactions-verbs-brainstorming [3] https://github.com/schemaorg/schemaorg/commits/sdo-ganymede -- Kelly Davis Bringing a voice to Firefox OS _______________________________________________ dev-platform mailing list dev-platform@lists.mozilla.org https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo/dev-platform
