Extensible modular markup

Educational level: this is a research resource.
Educational level: this is a tertiary (university) resource.

Extensible modular markup (EMM) is an attempt to develop a replacement for HTML and LaTeX. It is already supported in software and is already practically useful.

This replacements should be:

  • with support of both semantic and visual/audible markup
  • universal markup for all cases
  • extensible by regular users (by adding new namespaces and pluggable converters)
  • scriptable (like TeX, but with a thoughtful XML syntax)

It aims to be an universal markup format for such consumers (and others) as browsers and search engines.

The main idea that everybody can add a module (identified by an XML namespace and described by an RDF resource) to EMM.

The following modules are supported:

See also The practical guide on how to use EMM.

Using special software such as XML Boiler it is possible to convert "unknown" namespaces to a document containing namespaces known to a given consumer.

The aimed subprojects:

  • Modules based on XHTML2, with the same element names, but different namespaces:
    • the basic module with minimal markup facilities. It would for example have no addr element, because it is enough to use span element with a class to represent an address in a browser.
    • modules providing extensive semantic markup. These modules are to be used by advanced consumers like search engines or converters and also to be converted to more basic markup using converter software (such as one based on RDF markup).
  • More modules

Future Web architecture

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It is expected that the future Web sites will publish advanced XML markup and it will be possible to convert it to more basic form by specific proxy servers (free of paid).

Our task

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Our task is to develop the modules and software to convert to other formats.