[whatwg] Expanding the cite element

[Simpson, Grant Leyton]

Dear WHATWG list participants,

Forgive me if this conversation has been had before; I've just recently joined the list.

Is there any value in adding an "href" or "uri" or similar attribute to the <cite> element to indicate a location for a work (or information about the work) or, in the case of a URI, an indicator that can be used as a reference programmatically?

<q> has a "cite" attribute, so it seems to me that if we have a place to link to further information in <q> it makes sense to do so in <cite>.  After all, whether an author quotes from a reference (<q>) or merely discusses it without quoting (<cite>), both of these would end up in a works cited in a traditional paper.  Therefore, I think both should link (or refer) to somewhere.

If it were a URI (and therefore not necessarily retrievable), it would help in cases where the same work gets referenced in slightly different ways:

<p>As Ashley Crandall Amos says in <cite uri="http://example.com/books/crandall/linguisticmeans">Linguistic Means of Determining the Dates of Old English Literary Texts</cite> ... Amos also mentions in <cite uri="http://example.com/books/crandall/linguisticmeans">Linguistic Means</cite></p>

✍
Best,

Grant Simpson
¶ Senior Analyst/Programmer, Office of the Registrar
¶ Doctoral Student, Department of English
¶ Representative, IU Bloomington Professional Council
Indiana University Bloomington



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