CC License Validator

Mike Linksvayer ml at creativecommons.org
Mon Oct 20 16:26:01 EDT 2003


Nathan R. Yergler wrote:
> Based on yesterday's feedback I've just uploaded a new version of the 
> validator which fixes a handful of bugs.  You can find it at 
> http://www.yergler.net/projects/ccvalidator .  As always, feedback, 
> comments and (constructive) criticism is welcome.

Very good!  I've already found and fixed an XML encoding bug due to your 
application.

A few suggestions:

<http://w3.org/RDF/Validator> has a few trivial features that really 
help usability --
* separate forms for RDF textarea and URL input (I think URL input 
overrides anything in the text area in ccvalidator)
* clear textarea & clear URL
* loads with an example in the textarea, allowing for instant experience


Better diagnosis of error conditions.  If my XML isn't well formed, I 
should be told so, preferably with a list of problems.


Problems with one RDF segment shouldn't impact processing of any others 
that may be on the page.


In the future you may wish to do more stringent checking of RDF/XML 
validity.  It seems to me that I can add random (well formed XML) junk 
to a good RDF/XML document that wouldn't get past the W3C RDF validator.


On the results page it may be nice for users if
- RDF/XML source was exposable, perhaps with a CSS show/hide toggle, e.g.,

   Segment 1 [show raw RDF]

- anything that looks like a URL was clickable

- rdf:about was displayed.  Where the value is "" it should be taken to 
be the URI of the enclosing document.

- a URI like urn:sha1:... was made clickable as a MAGNET 
<http://magnet-uri.sourceforge.net> link.

- when an RDF segment is found which doesn't contain CC Work/License 
info, tell the user, and if possible hint at what might be there, e.g.,

   Segment 5 [show raw RDF]
   - no CC Work or License info found
   - probably contains trackback info


I hope the above suggestions are constructive.  In any case, thanks for 
creating this very useful tool!

-- 
   Mike Linksvayer
   http://creativecommons.org/learn/aboutus/people#21




More information about the cc-metadata mailing list