Re: What to do given both SYSTEM and PUBLIC?

At 11:08 AM -0500 2/19/97, Steven J. DeRose wrote:
>At 12:52 PM 02/18/97 -0800, Joe English wrote:
>>Try to resolve either one.  If that fails, try the other.
>>It doesn't matter which one you try first.

>So two systems that do opposite things are both conforming? That seems very
>ODA-like (I take that as a negative): "your system can do either the logical
>structure, or the layout, or both" -- so immediately you end up with
>non-interoperable yet conforming systems.

One of my cars requires that I select the gear ratio from a limited numberof
choices.  The other one gives me only a small amount of control over what gear
ratio it selects automatically by a built-in algorithm.  If you get a Volvo
960 (and undoubtably many others) you can choose to have absolute control over
the gear ratio selection or to let the built-in algorithm make the selection.
All three possibilities are useful, make for useful product differentiation,
and I for one would be upset if someone felt that they had to mandate which
kind of vehicle I owned.  Yet they are not directly interoperable systems; I
can't count on a user interfacing correctly with one if he or she has developed
his or her inteface for the other.

(Note: this is an analogy, not an exact parallel.  Don't give me grief just
because the analogy can be overextended to the point where there are
differences.)

Dave Peterson
SGMLWorks!

davep@acm.org