Appendix B. Notes on Using the Link Header with the Atom Format

Atom conveys links in the atom:link element, with the "href"
attribute indicating the target IRI and the "rel" attribute
containing the relation type.  The context of the link is either a
feed IRI or an entry ID, depending on where it appears; generally,
feed-level links are obvious candidates for transmission as a Link
header.

When serialising an atom:link into a Link header, it is necessary to
convert target IRIs (if used) to URIs.

Atom defines extension relation types in terms of IRIs. This specification re-defines them as URIs, to simplify and reduce errors in their comparison.

Atom allows registered link relation types to be serialised as absolute URIs. Such relation types SHOULD be converted to the appropriate registered form (e.g., "http://www.iana.org/assignments/relation/self" to "self") so that they are not mistaken for extension relation types.

Furthermore, Atom link relation types are always compared in a case-sensitive fashion; therefore, registered link relation types SHOULD be converted to their registered form (usually, lowercase) when serialised in an Atom document.

Note also that while the Link header allows multiple relations to be serialised in a single link, atom:link does not. In this case, a single link-value may map to several atom:link elements.

As with HTML, atom:link defines some attributes that are not explicitly mirrored in the Link header syntax, but they can also be used as link-extensions to maintain fidelity.