Which format: "txt", json, yaml, schema, hCard?

[Javier Fernandez Escribano]

You can view all the pros and cons here https://github.com/fesja/businesstxt/wiki/Which-format

Add what you feel it's necessary to take into account and lets discuss it here.

[Jose M Robles]

Hi! 

I think the format. "Txt" is the best and should be mandatory. Then each site additionally might have the same information in another format (using utilities like: x2y)

On the cons.

• Traffic.
                   How bussiness.txt occupies? 2 or 3 KB. In principle, a robot should not go often to read. Of course, enabled gzip.
  
• Non-technical users may not be precise enough when creating the file.
                  "Fuzzy" parses, likes HTML parsers

I vote for .txt :)

Kind regards!

[Fernando Gallego]

Hi there!

For me, this file doesn't need to be in a human readable format, but it must be created by non technical humans in a very easy way and read by machines, so with this premises, I would choose the easiest file format that a machine can read, but maintaining it's readability for technical humans. I think that is also important to make it lightweight to reduce network traffic overhead, so what about a zipped json file format? It is easy to unzip and to read by a machine, keeping it readable for humans that know what they are looking for.

For non technical people like business owners, they will need a web form to insert or update their data and store it on their website root, so this script should be placed on the same domain, included and configured by the website developer, and it should be error prone to future "server side language" changes or updates, and usable for non technical people like the business owners, so it must include as many input boxes as needed to define it's data format without mistakes.

The sad part is that even if many businesses implement it, crawlers will still need to look for other ways if it is not present, so it means more work for the crawling companies. Maybe you can provide ready to use libraries on different languages to make it easier to implement and to parse so more companies adopt it and increase the success chances.

Fernando.

[Doc Sheldon]

I believe that a .txt file in the root is a good solution. It's within the capabilities of more business owners than any other standardized format, and will be universally readable.

[Imre Papuscan]

Hi! I would suggest using something based on an existing standard, and not to create a brand new syntax. IMHO the best solution would be an XML file based on schema.org (http://schema.org/LocalBusiness). For non technical users I would suggest creating the file with a tool to avoid syntax errors.