Which tincan verbs to use

Question

For data normalisation of standard tin can verbs, is it best to use verbs from the tincan registry https://registry.tincanapi.com/#home/verbs e.g.

completed http://activitystrea.ms/schema/1.0/complete

or to use the adl verbs like those defined:

• in the 1.0 spec at https://github.com/adlnet/xAPI-Spec/blob/master/xAPI.md
• this article http://tincanapi.com/2013/06/20/deep-dive-verb/
• and listed at https://github.com/RusticiSoftware/tin-can-verbs/tree/master/verbs

e.g.

completed http://adlnet.gov/expapi/verbs/completed

I'm confused as to why those in the registry differ from every other example I can find. Is one of these out of date?

Answer 1

It really depends on which "profile" you want to target with your Statements. If you are trying to stick to e-learning practices that most closely resemble SCORM or some other standard then the ADL verbs may be most fitting. It is a very limited set, and really only the "voided" verb is provided for by the specification. The other verbs were related to those found in 0.9 and have become the de facto set, but aren't any more "standard" than any other URI. If you are targeting statements to be used in an Activity Streams way, specifically with a social application then you may want to stick with their set. Note that there are verbs in the Registry that are neither ADL coined or provided by the Activity Streams specification.

If you aren't targeting any specific profile (or existing profile) then you should use the terms that best capture the experiences which you are trying to record. And we ask that you either coin those terms at our Registry so that they are well formed and publicly available, or if you coin them under a different domain then at least get them catalogued in our Registry so others may find them. Registering a particular term in one or more registries will hopefully help keep the list of terms from exploding as people search for reusable items. This will ultimately make reporting tools more interoperable with different content providers.