Web Science and Digital Libraries Research Group

Extending our previous discussion about how the proposed rel="identifier" is different from rel="canonical" (spoiler alert: "canonical" is only for pages with duplicative text ), here I summarize various discussions about why we can't use rel="bookmark" for the proposed scenarios .  We've already given a brief review of why rel="bookmark" won't work (spoiler alert: it is explicitly prohibited for HTML <link> elements or HTTP Link: headers) but here we more deeply explore the likely original semantics.  I say "likely original semantics" because: the short phrases in the IANA link relations registry ("Gives a permanent link to use for bookmarking purposes") and the HTML5 specification ("Gives the permalink for the nearest ancestor section") are not especially clear, nor is the example in the HTML5 specification.  rel="bookmark" exists to address a problem, anonymous co

The rel="identifier" draft has been submitted to the IETF.  Some of the feedback we've received via Twitter and email are variations of 'why don't you use rel="canonical" to link to the DOI?'  We discussed this in our original blog post about rel="identifier" , but in fairness that post discussed a great deal of things and through updates and comments it has become quite lengthy.  The short answer is that rel="canonical" handles cases where there are two or more URIs for a single resource (AKA " URI aliases "), whereas  rel="identifier" specifies relationships between multiple resources. Having two or more URIs for the same resource is also known as " DUST: different URLs, similar text ".  This is common place with SEO and catalogs (see the 2009 Google blog post and help center article about rel="canonical").  RFC 6596 gives abstract examples, but below we will examine real world e

(2018-06-08 update: as a result of community feedback, we replaced " identifier " with " cite-as ".  We chose to keep the examples below intact, but please substitute rel="cite-as" whenever you see rel="identifier". -- MLN&HVDS) Do you remember hearing about that study that found that people who are "good" at swearing actually have a large vocabulary, refuting the conventional wisdom about a "poverty-of-vocabulary"?  The DOI ( digital object identifier ) for the 2015 study is*: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.langsci.2014.12.003 But if you read about it in the popular press, such as the Independent or US News & World Report , you'll see that they linked to: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S038800011400151X The problem is that although the DOI is the preferred link, browsers follow a series of redirects from the DOI to the ScienceDirect link, which is then displayed in the address bar of