[Bug 1618] New: the formal type notation for element is ambiguous

http://www.w3.org/Bugs/Public/show_bug.cgi?id=1618

           Summary: the formal type notation for element is ambiguous
           Product: XPath / XQuery / XSLT
           Version: Last Call drafts
          Platform: PC
        OS/Version: Windows 2000
            Status: NEW
          Severity: normal
          Priority: P2
         Component: Formal Semantics
        AssignedTo: simeon@us.ibm.com
        ReportedBy: fred.zemke@oracle.com
         QAContact: public-qt-comments@w3.org


2.4.2 Item types
The following formal type notation is ambiguous: 
"element nillable of type foo:bar".  Is this an element whose
name is nillable and type is foo:bar (and not nillable), or 
is this an element of unspecified name whose type is foo:bar
and nillable?  One easy way to fix this would be to move the
keyword "nillable" to a context where it cannot be mistaken for
a name, for example, following TypeReference rather than 
preceding it.  Thus rule [34 (Formal)] would be
TypeSpecifier ::= TypeReference Nillable?
Another way to fix it would be to say that ElementName must be
quoted, ie, change rule [9 (Formal)] to
ElementName ::= '"' QName '"'
Or, following my suggestion that the grammar should have
no defaults, make the element name mandatory (either a 
QName or an asterisk, say).

Received on Friday, 15 July 2005 01:07:57 UTC