Signposting.org browser extension

This Chrome browser extension sniffs for the presence of signposting.org headers in the HTTP headers (Link: <http://my.data> rel="describedby") or HTML links (<link href="my.data" rel="describedby/>).

The presence of such headers is reported as a dismissible banner on the page.

The goal of signposting is to let robot clients navigate to metadata associated with a typically human-readable landing page for a dataset. The goal of this browser extension is to make those robot-navigable links human-readable.

Install

• Install from the Chrome Webstore
• Browse the scholarly web; e.g. try visiting a sample on the HoloFood Data Portal or Stian Soiland-Reyes' test pages.

Dev setup

• Clone this repository
• Open Chrome/Chromium/Chromium-based browsers
• Navigate to chrome://extensions
• Toggle on "Developer mode"
• "Load unpacked", and select the folder containing the repository

Status

This extension is a PoC.

Contributions

Are very welcome via Issues and/or Pull Requests.

Privacy and data collection

This extension requires several permissions to read the data in your web browser. These permissions are required so that the extension can read the presence and content of Signposting links in both the HTTP headers, and the HTML content, of the scholarly webpages you are visiting / developing. The current permissions required are detailed in the manifest.json file of this code repostiory. Note that none of the data collected and/or created by these permissions is sent over the network to any remote code or database. Neither the developers of this extension, nor the owners of the signposted websites you visit, receive any additional information collected or processed by this extension. It is purely a client side (i.e., in your browser) extension to help with development and discovery of the scholarly web.

Notable lacking features:

• support for Signposting in Linksets
• warning of / deterministic resolution of clashing headers between HTTP and HTML
• test suite (perhaps running through s11.no/2022/a2a-fair-metrics/?)
• encapsulated CSS
• arguably unneccesary use of storage API; could be achieved with message handlers instead
• submission to Chrome Web Store
• Firefox / Edge version