Re: Normative Dependency and the Seven Drafts

Hi, Anne-

Anne van Kesteren wrote (on 8/18/09 2:43 AM):
> On Tue, 18 Aug 2009 05:46:37 +0200, Doug Schepers <schepers@w3.org> wrote:
>> It's not really the spin-off aspect that is the issue, it's the
>> maturity along the Recommendation Track. The same situation applies to
>> the XmlHttpRequest (XHR) spec, which was never part of HTML5, but
>> which has a normative dependency on aspects of the HTML5 spec (that
>> is, XHR references HTML5 for an essential part of its functionality).
>
> XMLHttpRequest was part of HTML5. (Though it was taken out before the
> W3C published an HTML5 draft.)

Nope... it was never part of "HTML5".  It was part of "WHATWG Web 
Applications 1.0", parts of which went on to become HTML5, but that's 
not quite the same thing.

I was speaking of specifications with regards to the Rec track.  XHR was 
never part of any W3C Recommendation-track document other than itself. 
The HTML WG wasn't chartered until March 2007, and didn't have a FPWD 
until January 2008.  XHR had its FPWD in April 2006, and was first 
specified by Microsoft on MSDN.  It didn't even mention the HTML spec 
until its 5th draft in June 2007.  Are you sure you're actually the 
editor of that spec? :)

Not that any of that actually shines any light on the explanation of the 
relationship of documents on the Rec track.


> The reason XMLHttpRequest references HTML5 by the way is because HTML5
> defines some essential bits of the Web platform that are not defined
> anywhere else. Pretty much any specification that defines an API in
> detail needs to reference HTML5.

How so?  Isn't Web IDL a more relevant spec to reference when defining 
an API?


Regards-
-Doug Schepers
W3C Team Contact, SVG and WebApps WGs

Received on Tuesday, 18 August 2009 07:09:50 UTC