The POWDER Working Group is specifying a protocol for publishing descriptions of (e.g. metadata about) Web resources using RDF, OWL, and HTTP.

Charter and History

The POWDER Working Group Charter shows what the W3C has asked this working group to do.

POWDER Working Group

The POWDER Working Group (member only link) is open to W3C members and invited experts. The working group meets weekly by phone. Face-to-face meetings are held up to four times per year.

Members

The following W3C Member organizations have appointed participants to this Working Group (details are Member-only):

Joining the POWDER Working Group

If your organization is already a member of W3C, ask your W3C Advisory Committee Representative to appoint you using the join/leave Web forms. This will also automatically subscribe you to the WG mailing list.

More information about the W3C is available as is information about joining W3C.

Mailing Lists & Blogs

Relationship with Other W3C Work

Mobile Web Best Practices

The development of the mobileOK trustmark is an important use case and test case for description resources.

Rule Interchange Format

POWDER has an inherent need for rules to define the scope of a description and for when one description should be used in preference to another. Furthermore, some applications will store user preferences as rules and it it will be beneficial to be able to copy these user preferences between clients. Cooperation and discussion with RIF is therefore important.

Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI)

The POWDER Working Group seeks close cooperation with WAI on the labelling of resources that meet WCAG guidelines and with the ERT WG on integration with EARL.

Technical Architecture Group

TAG has published a number of relevant findings and POWDER will need to ensure conformance with these. For example the April 2006 finding on Authoritative Metadata.

Semantic Web Deployment Working Group

POWDER will need to draw on this group's expertise and guidance, particularly in relation to the applications of POWDER deliverables outside Description Resources.

Ubiquitous Web Applications Working Group

There may be features in common between the protocol for accessing description resources developed by POWDER and a protocol useful for CC/PP. The POWDER Working Group should track future work on a protocol for CC/PP in the Ubiquitous Web Applications Working Group (successor to the Device Independence Working Group) and identify any such opportunities for common features.

XML Activity

POWDER will need to explore non-Semantic Web technologies as alternative approaches to meeting its aims. In particular input will be sought from the XML Query (XQuery) group on the resource grouping Recommendation.