Doug Bowman of Stop Design talked to us on Common Structure. There is very little reuse on the web, we are constantly reinventing the wheel. Over and over again. Yet there are some common patterns. That might be with websites (blog, wiki, etc) or what they are used for (support, document list) of page patterns (contact, archive) or module patterns (header, footer, blogroll) etc.
We need to ask, seek, and document. There has been research into these patterns and whether they actually exist. 90% of sites use the id ‘footer’. Everything else is repeated, but no where near the same level.
You can approach patterns from the top down (page patterns and modules), or the bottom up (XHTML, microformats, etc) but there is still a gap where the two meet. Two types of grouping is proposed, to identify and to classify. We need to start simple, identify those common patterns, and reuse popular taconomy (footer, etc) and enable participation on a global level.
There is a hidden deep web that is HUGE. But missing out of the benefits that could be attained here.
Allowing users more (yes more!) control. Scary… but the “web is the web”. Nice.
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