Behavior of instance src on link failure

Not that I want more work for myself or anything, but...

We restored the 'src' attribute on instance, and not just as a linking 
attribute but as a special attribute of instance because it has its own 
schedule of execution and special behavior on link failure.

The behavior on failure is an xforms-link-exception, which is fatal.

It has always been this way, so when I restored the text, I restored what 
used to be there.

However, I recall Steven saying something in passing at the last face to 
face meeting that seems worth double-checking.

I recall him saying it was his understanding that if an instance contained 
data AND an src, and the src failed, then the instance content would be 
used.  This cannot happen if an xforms-link-exception occurs.

Question: Should src produce an xforms-link-exception on failure, as 
specified now, or should it produce either no error or an 
xforms-link-error if the instance has either content or a resource 
attribute?

If this is needed for XForms 1.1, then my hope is that someone will take 
the action item to write the spec-ready text for the change.  It's not too 
hard, but a bit of care is needed to balance the relationship between src, 
instance content, and the resource attribute.

Cheers,
John M. Boyer, Ph.D.
STSM: Lotus Forms Architect and Researcher
Chair, W3C Forms Working Group
Workplace, Portal and Collaboration Software
IBM Victoria Software Lab
E-Mail: boyerj@ca.ibm.com 

Blog: http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/blogs/page/JohnBoyer