The Resource Description Framework (RDF) web metadata format has an XML syntax RDF/XML which has been described as a ugly and flawed, mainly as a consequence of it being an early XML format, dating from 1998. This presentation will describe the perceived and real problems and select appropriate modern XML and web best practices for improving RDF markup that can be better used with the latest XML technologies such as XSLT 2 and XQuery.

The presentation will distinguish a semantic web markup format rather than a format intended solely for software as one intended to be easier for end users to author and more clearly be appropriate for typical application areas of lightweight web metadata and authored web ontologies.

XML best practice in any area is a tricky subject to discuss and get agreement on but the XML technologies considered include XML Namespaces, XML QNames in content, omitting some darker corners of the XML specification along with use of clear user-friendly technologies such as the RELAXNG grammar-based XML schema language, part of the ISO DSDL work. The presentation will also discuss approaches starting from XHTML to generate semantic web data.