THE XML REVOLUTION - TECHNOLOGIES FOR THE FUTURE WEB

Behavior

- link semantics

Arcs can be annotated with abstract behavior information using the following attributes:

xlink:show - what happens when the link is activated?

Possible values:

embed: insert the presentation of the target resource (the one at the end of the arc) in place of the source resource (the one at the beginning of the arc, where traversal was initiated) (example: as images in HTML)
new: display the target resource some other place without affecting the presentation of the source resource (example: as target="_blank" in an HTML link)
replace: replace the presentation of the resource containing the source with a presentation of the destination (example: as normal HTML links)
other: behavior specified elsewhere
none: no behavior is specified

xlink:actuate - when is the link activated?

Possible values:

onLoad: traverse the link immediately when recognized (example: as HTML images)
onRequest: traverse when explicitly requested (example: as normal HTML links)
other: behavior specified elsewhere
none: no behavior is specified

Note: these notions of link behavior are rather abstract and do not make sense for all applications.

Semantic attributes: describe the meaning of link resources and arcs

xlink:title: provide human readable descriptions (also available as xlink:type="title" to allow markup)
xlink:role and xlink:arcrole: URI references to descriptions