Re: Syntax doc comments

From where I left off ...
<<
7.2.1 Grammar start
So should I say more or less?
>>
I prefer less.

<<
[[We never disallowed rdf:nil did we?]]

We didn't micro-decide everything, I asked one, got no replies so
made a choice.  rdf:nil is a sentinel, we can either:
   1) not encourage its use as a class or property and forbid it everywhere
   2) not care, and allow it everywhere.

Do you want to change to 2) ?
>>

2) seems to be more consistent - it is only syntactic terms like
rdf:Description that cannot be used as a property; I don't see why using
rdf:nil as a class is any more wrong than using rdf:subject as one.

7.2.18
<<
MUST
>>

My problem with the MUST was not what you were trying to say, but what you
actually said.

What you were trying to say is (more or less) that the grammar treats
"FooBar" like "Literal"; what you actually said is that processing MUST
(i.e. all implementations have to do this way) continue at a rule which some
implementations won't even have. (e.g. SNAIL does not follow this framework
at all; a conventially parser like VRP works over strings and so cannot be
said to have production parseTypeLiteralPropertyElt and so cannot follow
this MUST).

Yes you have carefully said that implementations only have to have the same
effect, that observation makes the MUST incorrect. This is really linked to
my observation that the MUST, SHOULD etc terminology is not used
sufficiently in this doc to justify its inclusion.

It is possible to rephrase in a way that does not use this MUST,

cf. Dan's
http://www.w3.org/2001/01/mp23
[[
I try to use the word MUST to constrain agents in processes, not to just
make declarative statements; i.e. I think it's a misuse of RFC2119 to say
things like "2 + 2 MUST be 4"
]]




Jeremy

Received on Thursday, 31 October 2002 01:00:32 UTC