XLink 1999-12-20 WD questions

I apologize in advance if the following have been discussed at length; 
however, I don't believe they have (or if they have, I've missed them).

1. The WD includes various "sample" declarations of XLink 
elements/attributes. Is it safe to assume that the term "sample" means 
"non-normative"? In particular, I'm interested in the declaration of the 
role attribute. In several (all?) places, this is declared as being of type 
NMTOKEN; would it be possible/desirable to allow it to be of type NMTOKENS 
instead? This would permit a given resource to be associated with more than 
one arc at a time.

2. What was the thinking behind the option of using XLink *elements* 
instead of XLink attributes? This seems rather perverse; at least, it goes 
against the grain of the general "XML shall be easy to process" design 
goal, since an XLink-aware application must now keep an eye cocked in both 
directions at once. It makes XLink harder to "grok" (providing *more* ways 
to perform a given task -- especially, as far as I know, without any marked 
advantage to one way over another -- *never* simplifies things). And it 
encourages the use of the (to my taste) horrid ANY content model.

3. Minor editorial suggestions:

a. 1.3 [Terminology] In definition of "resource," change phrase "...that is 
participating in a link" to "...that may participate in a link." (As it 
stands, this "abstract sense" definition matches the definition of 
"participating resource": "A resource that takes part in a link.")

b. 3.1.4 [Traversal rules for an extended link] Paragraph immediately 
preceding "Constraint: No Arc Duplication":
	...behavior of such a link with is the same....
	                           ^^^^
Presumably "with" should be struck there.

c. 4.3 [Conformance Requirements for XLink Elements] In the numbered item 
1, strike the word "either" in the first bullet. ("Either" already appears 
in the parent numbered item.)

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Received on Thursday, 13 January 2000 12:29:36 UTC