CDR: Appendix B lacks testable conformance criteria for user agents

Appendix B (Conformance Criteria) does not include any meaningful,  
testable conformance criteria for user agents.


"Conformant user agent must implement DOM Level 3 Core interfaces."

- This and other statements in this section should be rewritten to  
start with "A conformant user agent" or "Conformant user agents", it  
is ungrammatical as written.

- The body of the spec says DOM Level 3 Core subsets are allowed, but  
this calls specifically for L3Core. What is the intent? It sould be  
made clear in all places. Also, it may be more clear to just say  
"must implement DOM Level 3 Core", since it adds nothing to say  
"interfaces". Also, if a subset (any subset) is allowed, then this  
criterion means nothing and is not testable.

"Conformant user agent must implement DOM Level 3 Event interfaces."

- same comments as above

"Conformant user agent must support specialized DOM interfaces  
required by the profile."

- Surely this requirement should be called for by the profiles  
themselves. It's weird for a spec to demand conformance with  
unspecified other specs. Also, since no specific interfaces are  
required, this criterion is not testable.

"Conformant user agent must support ReferencedDocument interface."

- Since the body of the spec makes this a "may" and even then  
declines to state what particular objects should implement this  
interface, this is not a testable conformance criterion.

"Conformant user agent must support ReferencingElement interface."

- Since the body of the spec makes this a "may" and even then  
declines to state what particular objects should implement this  
interface, this is not a testable conformance criterion.

"Conformant user agent must support DocumentEventPropagation interface."

- Since the body of the spec declines to state what particular  
objects should implement this interface, this is not a testable  
conformance criterion.

Regards,
Maciej

Received on Monday, 2 January 2006 10:15:13 UTC