RDFa is a way to embed metadata in ordinary web-pages. It's useful in many situations, and this presentation looks particularly at how RDFa can help governments pursuing open data policies.

1. RDFa and
government data
Mark Birbeck
Backplane Ltd. and W3C Invited Expert

2. What is RDFa?

3. Embed data in HTML
and XHTML

4. Why embed data?
• Removes ambiguity about the content
within a page.
• Makes publishing data as easy as publishing
HTML.

5. Precise information
Embedding metadata removes the ambiguity about the
content of our pages

7. Title: Chanda’s Secrets by Allan Stratton
Stars: *****
I reviewed Stratton's newest teen novel, Leslie's Journal in
October. I'd heard about Chanda's Secrets and wanted to give
it a try. ...

8. <div xmlns:v="http://rdf.data-vocabulary.org/#"
typeof="v:Review"
>
<span rel="v:itemreviewed">
<span>
Title: <span property="v:name">Chanda’s Secrets</span>
</span>
</span>
Stars: <span property="v:rating" content="5">*****</span>
<span property="v:summary">
I reviewed Stratton's newest teen novel, Leslie's Journal in October.
I'd heard about Chanda's Secrets and wanted to give it a try. ...
</span>
</div>

9. Number of stars, price range,
etc., all picked up from the
web-page via RDFa and

12. Publishing HTML was
never easier

15. Embed data to make
publishing data as easy
as publishing HTML

16. Case study: Vacancies
and consultations
Distributing data in UK government web-sites

21. Static page
ASP.NET
Who knows?

25. Momentum for
governments to make
data 'open'

29. Linked Data
Joining the linked data cloud

31. <div
typeof="v:Review"
>
<span rel="v:itemreviewed">
<span about="urn:ISBN:1550378341" typeof="bib:book">
Title: <span property="v:name">Chanda’s Secrets</span>
</span>
</span>
Stars: <span property="v:rating" content="5">*****</span>
<span property="v:summary">
I reviewed Stratton's newest teen novel, Leslie's Journal in October.
I'd heard about Chanda's Secrets and wanted to give it a try. ...
</span>
</div>

33. Mark Birbeck’s Twitter account name is
<span
typeof="foaf:OnlineAccount"
rel="foaf:accountServiceHomePage" resource="http://twitter.com"
property="foaf:accountName"
>markbirbeck</span>
and Ben Adida’s is
<span
typeof="foaf:OnlineAccount"
rel="foaf:accountServiceHomePage" resource="http://twitter.com"
property="foaf:accountName"
>benadida</span>

35. The future: Open
access to the data
Anyone can make up their own data sets

38. RDFa
• Removes ambiguity about page data
• Makes it easy for anyone to publish data
• Powerful enough to enable the publishing
of Linked Data
• Ideal for publishing government data

39. W3C Standards
• RDFa is a standard, building on other
standards, such as RDF
• With SPARQL, have a solid foundation for
publishing government data

40. • http://webBackplane.com/rdfa
• http://webBackplane.com/mark-birbeck
• http://rdfa.info
• http://linkeddata.org