Re: Web IDL Garden Hose (was: ECMA TC 39 / W3C HTML and WebApps WG coordination)

On Sep 26, 2009, at 3:58 PM, Cameron McCormack wrote:

> Cameron McCormack:
>>> Indeed, much of the custom [[Get]] etc. functionality can be  
>>> turned into
>>> ES5 meta-object stuff.  A pertinent question is then: should we  
>>> change
>>> Web IDL to specify an ES5 binding (and not ES3) at this point, given
>>> that specs depending on it want to advance along the Rec track?
>
> Mark S. Miller:
>> Since ES5 will be officially done well ahead of HTML5, I don't see  
>> why
>> not. But I do not know what your "Rec track" constraints imply.
>
> For example, Selectors API is at Last Call and will soon be in  
> Candidate
> Recommendation.  I don’t think it can progress further than that until
> its dependencies move forward.

Selectors can't progress to PR/REC until Web IDL is in at least CR  
state (only one difference in maturity level is allowed for  
dependencies). I think Web IDL can enter CR with ES5 as is, but it  
will be considered final as soon as it is published, which is likely  
to be before Web IDL is ready for Last Call. ECMA process does not  
have any states between the equivalent of W3C Working Draft and W3C  
REC (as far as I know). So I don't think this would create any  
problems for Selectors advancing, other than the time to do the rewrite.

On the substantive issue: I do think it would be good to convert Web  
IDL from ES3 formalisms to ES5 formalisms. While Oliver is right that  
ES5 has not yet been proven by interoperable implementations, and that  
some of its methods as defined have a hard time with host objects, I  
believe that the basic designs of ES5 property descriptors and ES5  
getters/setters are sound.

Regards,
Maciej

Received on Saturday, 26 September 2009 23:45:42 UTC