RE: ACTION-892: Information Conformance Statement for CT Guidelines

Just commenting from the sidelines... I find the version with SHOULD and MUST together to be the better version. While I can understand that the SHOULD levels present the implementers with "grey areas" to consider, and therefore a greater demand for guidance/explanation, seeing these clauses excerpted in this manner does not provide sufficient context for a proper understanding.

The tabular format is rather good, I must say. However, I cannot see the reason why one would permit a comments cell for the MUST clauses. In such cases, failure to comply with a MUST means total non-compliance, and I would not offer a "comments box" for excuses. Perhaps those cells should be greyed out, and the Introduction amended so as to stress that comments only apply to explanations for non-compliance with the SHOULD or SHOULD NOT clauses.

My 2c worth.

---Rotan

PS The text of 4.1.5.4 looks odd.



-----Original Message-----
From: public-bpwg-request@w3.org [mailto:public-bpwg-request@w3.org] On Behalf Of Francois Daoust
Sent: 23 June 2009 12:55
To: Mobile Web Best Practices Working Group WG
Subject: ACTION-892: Information Conformance Statement for CT Guidelines

Hi,

Per my ACTION-892, please find below links to two different versions of 
the Implementation Conformance Statement that should ship with the 
guidelines.

The action was:
[[
Prepare an ICS with MUST/MUST NOT (to view if that's a good idea), try 
to add a "depends on" column, explain "Not applicable" or remove it.
]]

I chose to remove the "Not applicable" column. I agree it merely created 
confusion with no useful outcome.
I haven't tried to add a "depend on" column. I am not sure how to do it, 
and wonder whether that would be of any use in our case anyway.

The ICS is generated automatically from the spec (through an XSLT 
stylesheet). The excerpts are atomic, i.e. one line per normative 
statement, but that means some sentences needed to be cut into pieces, 
and some excerpts do look meaningless without context.

I prepared two versions of the ICS that matches the latest draft of the 
guidelines: one that contains both SHOULD-level and MUST-level 
statements (this includes SHOULD NOT, RECOMMENDED, and the rest of the 
tribe, of course), and another one that only contains SHOULD-level 
statements. The rationale for the ICS was to have exceptions to the 
SHOULD statements explained, and so we had initially restricted the 
statements to put in the ICS to SHOULD-level statements only. I must say 
that I now find the "full" version with MUST-level statements as well 
more useful.

Version with SHOULD-level and MUST-level statements:
http://www.w3.org/2005/MWI/BPWG/Group/TaskForces/CT/editors-drafts/Guidelines/ics-090622-must


Version with SHOULD-level statements only:
http://www.w3.org/2005/MWI/BPWG/Group/TaskForces/CT/editors-drafts/Guidelines/ics-090622


(Please ignore the Abstract and Introduction sections for the time 
being, they do need to be rewritten, in particular for the version that 
contains SHOULD-level and MUST-level statements)

For dizcussion/rezolution:
- "SHOULD and MUST" or "SHOULD only"?
- publish the ICS directly within the guidelines or as a separate document?
- comments to improve the table?

Francois.

Received on Tuesday, 23 June 2009 12:32:44 UTC