Continuation of XForms Streamlined for Web Authors

We have a good basis for the streamlined syntax [1]

[1] http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-forms/2008Mar/0097.html


However, there are now follow-up issues to address:

1) What should "implied" submission look like?

I think the overall form structure looks like this

<form action="some URL" ...>
 
   optional expressed instances

   optional expressed submissions

   optional expressed binds

   all of the above may optionally be wrapped by a model element?

   form controls as in [1] above

</form>

The form tag is needed as the container for the set of things that will be 
generated into an implied model.

The action attribute would imply an XForms replace all submission in that 
model. 
The implied method should be in accord with the default method for HTML.
The implied serialization should be the default for HTML.
It should be possible to add the serialization attribute to ask for the 
XML of the implied instance.


2) What will be the relationship between expressed instances and the 
generated instance?

I think that you can express all the instances you want, but you get a 
generated instance if you use 'name' attributes in your form controls.
If you want to switch from implied instance to expressed instance, then 
you have to run a converter program on your form.

3) What is the relationship between expressed model(s) and the implied 
model?

I think we need to keep the notion of "nested models" in XForms 1.2, and 
we should regard models within form tag as inner models.

Anything else?

Thanks,
John M. Boyer, Ph.D.
Senior Technical Staff Member
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 

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