[Bug 2324] Value/General comparisons: type promotion for xs:anyURI/numeric

http://www.w3.org/Bugs/Public/show_bug.cgi?id=2324





------- Additional Comments From mike@saxonica.com  2005-10-01 18:36 -------
Firstly, Frans, I'm confident that it was the intention of the WG that both
numeric and URI promotion should apply to the operands of value comparison
operators. In fact, the primary motivation for the introduction of URI promotion
was to allow URIs to be tested for equality against string literals. (This was
after rejecting alternatives such as the introduction of a special URI literal.)

I'm inclined to agree with you that the specs don't say this very clearly,
though others may differ. Section B.1 does say:

Type promotion is used in evaluating function calls (see 3.1.5 Function Calls)
and operators that accept numeric or string operands

I think the problems are (a) B.1 doesn't say exactly how or when type promotion
is used in evaluating these operators, and (b) although B.1 says that type
promotion is used, section 3.5.1 (Value Comparisons) appears to differ, as it
gives a detailed sequence of steps for evaluating a value comparison that
doesn't include any reference to section B.1 or any mention of type promotion.

I'll stick my neck out and say that I'm pretty confident the WG will respond to
this issue by confirming that type promotion has always been intended to apply
to value comparisons.

Thanks for raising it.

Michael Kay (personal response)

Received on Saturday, 1 October 2005 18:36:51 UTC