xmlns attribute namespace

From: Garret Wilson <garret@globalmentor.com> Date: Wed, 20 Dec 2000 17:20:03 -0800 Message-ID: <013401c06aec$25fdf3c0$7245a640@pacbell.net> To: "www-dom list" <www-dom@w3.org> · This archive was generated by hypermail 2.2.0+W3C-0.50 : Tuesday, 27 October 2009 08:24:52 GMT

Since the DOM Level 2 binds namespace URIs at creation time, what namespace
would the "xmlns" attribute have?

Look at the following example from "Namespaces in XML"

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<!-- elements are in the HTML namespace, in this case by default -->
<html xmlns='http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40'>
  <head><title>Frobnostication</title></head>
  <body><p>Moved to
    <a href='http://frob.com'>here</a>.</p></body>
</html>

Since these example "elements are in the HTML namespace," does this mean
that the "xmlns" attribute is in the HTML namespace which it just defined?
Furthermore, should a DOM Level 2 implementation bind
http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40 as the namespace URI to "xmlns"?

Thanks,

Garret