How to write JSON-LD for list of people?

Question

I have a page that contains a list of people with a link of each that will open the main page of that person.

Each link should have its own structured data.

I'm using JSON-LD, but the example given is in Microdata format. So to write it in JSON-LD format, should I write the complete scripts for each URL?

The script for one URL is

  <script type="application/ld+json">
  {
  "@context": "http://schema.org",
  "@type": "Person",
  "address": {
    "@type": "PostalAddress",
    "addressLocality": "Seattle",
    "addressRegion": "WA",
    "postalCode": "98052",
    "streetAddress": "20341 Whitworth Institute 405 N. Whitworth"
  },
  "colleague": [
    "http://www.xyz.edu/students/alicejones.html",
    "http://www.xyz.edu/students/bobsmith.html"
  ],
  "email": "mailto:[email protected]",
  "image": "janedoe.jpg",
  "jobTitle": "Professor",
  "name": "Jane Doe",
  "telephone": "(425) 123-4567",
  "url": "http://www.janedoe.com"
}
</script>

Let's say I have a list of 15 persons on one page. Should I write these 15 scripts separately or there's some other way to write JSON-LD in that case?

Answer 1

You have several options:

• as top-level items
  (only use this if the other two options are not possible)
• as values for a property
  (best option, but requires that Schema.org offers a suitable type/property for your case)
• as ItemList
  (second-best option; requires that it makes sense to group them)

As top-level items

If you want to provide the Person items as top-level items (i.e., not nested as values for a property of some other type), you can either use multiple script elements, or one script element with @graph:

<script type="application/ld+json">
{
  "@context": "http://schema.org",
  "@type": "Person"
}
</script>

<script type="application/ld+json">
{
  "@context": "http://schema.org",
  "@type": "Person"
}
</script>

<script type="application/ld+json">
{
  "@context": "http://schema.org",
  "@graph": 
  [
    {
       "@type": "Person"
    },
    {
       "@type": "Person"
    }
  ]
}
</script>

As values for a property

If you want to provide the Person items as values for a property of some other type, use an array as value.

Example case: You could have an Organization and want to reference the employed Persons with the employee property:

<script type="application/ld+json">
{
  "@context": "http://schema.org",
  "@type": "Organization",
  "employee":
  [
    {
      "@type": "Person"
    },
    {
      "@type": "Person"
    }
  ]
}
</script>

As list

If you want to provide the Person items as list, you can use the ItemList type.

<script type="application/ld+json">
{
  "@context": "http://schema.org",
  "@type": "ItemList",
  "itemListElement": [
    {
      "@type": "Person"
    },
    {
      "@type": "Person"
    }
  ]
}
</script>

Answer 2

You can apply a property BreadcrumbList for your list. Something like this:

{
 "@context": "http://schema.org",
 "@type": "BreadcrumbList", 
 "name": "Name of the list",
 "description": "Description of the list",
 "itemListElement":
 [
  {
   "@type": "ListItem",
   "position": 1,
   "item":
   {
    "@type": "Person",
    "@id": "https://example.com/person1",
    "name": "name of person1"
    }
  },
  {
   "@type": "ListItem",
  "position": 2,
  "item":
   {
     "@type": "Person",
    "@id": "https://example.com/person2",
     "name": "name of person2"
   }
  }
 ]
}