[ESW Wiki] Update of "its0503ReqEntities"

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== HOW TO EDIT THIS PAGE: == - The content being developed is here, 
paragraph by paragraph, with relevant comments sandwiched between. The text 
of the content itself is bold. + The content being developed is here, 
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Related comments, and replies should be grouped together. Multiple 
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be grouped together. Multiple different comments relating to the same piece 
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'''[http://www.w3.org/International/geo/2004/article-devt-process.html 
Status: Initial Draft]'''   ie. please focus on technical content, rather 
than wordsmithing at this stage. + + = Requirements related to Entities = + 
+ == Challenge/Issue: == + + XML applications (i.e. a combination of 
DTD/XSD, stylesheets, XML instances) often are subdivided into physical 
units called entities (see 
http://www.xml.com/axml/target.html#sec-physical-struct). Various types of 
entities exist (see http://tech.irt.org/articles/js212/#intro). + + 
Examples: + +  1. A character entity. The entity defines a single Unicode 
character. + + Example: <!ENTITY aacute "&#225;" > + +  2. A short 
element-free text. The entity defines a short text that contains only text 
(no element or other XML constructs). This is for instance an entity for a 
product name. + + Example: <!ENTITY ProductName "PictoMagic for Windows" > 
+ +  3. A longer text with one or more elements. The entity defines a piece 
of boiler-plate text such as a copyright paragraph. + + Example: <!ENTITY 
CopyrightInfo "<a href='\copyright.htm'>Copyright</a> 2005 W3C."> + + Two 
aspects of entities are of particular importance with regard to 
internationalization and localization: + +  1.      entities are defined + 
2.      entities are used + + For example, the snippet + +         <!ENTITY 
ProductName "PictoMagic for Windows" > + + defines an entity called 
'ProductName', and the snippet +   +         The latest version of 
&ProductName; features many enhancements. + + references/uses the entity. + 
+ If internationalization and localization are not addressed for 
entity-related work several issues may arise: + +  1.      Entity reference 
cannot be resolved + + Example: the definition is not available to the XML 
processor + +  2.      Entity definition does not fit with the surrounding 
context language-wise + + Example: The context in 'Das Produkt 
&ProductName; ist mit vielen Erweiterungen ausgestattet worden' is German 
whereas the definition may be in English + +  3.      Entity definition 
does not fit with the surrounding context grammar-wise + + Example: The 
syntax in 'The latest version of &ProductName; features many enhancements' 
may be incorrect if the definition designates an object in plural. + + In 
addition, even if the entity itself is translated there may be significant 
grammatical problems for inflected languages for nouns. The translation 
will inevitably follow the case of the original. For example, if the 
original is genitive, the translation is genitive as well (of course this 
requires that the original language and the translation language have a 
concept for ‘genitive’). + + Since entities affect the content of the 
document, and XSLT processors and other kinds of XML processors act on the 
content, various processing-related issues may arise. An XSLT stylesheet 
for example, which is sensitive to content contributed by an entity, may 
fail to work as expected (e.g. may not be able to generate the 'alt' for 
HTML pages). + + == Notes: == + + Ideally, the solution which the WG will 
produce will be applicable not only with regard to entities but also in the 
realm of XInclude (see http://www.w3.org/TR/xinclude/) or even fragments 
(see http://www.w3.org/TR/2001/CR-xml-fragment-20010212#packaging). + + == 
Quick Guideline Thoughts: == + +  1. If possible, XML applications should 
avoid the use of entities. + +  2. XML applications which have to make use 
of entities have to be build in such a way that entities can be localized 
easily (ie. the XML application has to be internationalized wrt. entities). 
+ +  3. If entities are used, the XML instances should be declared as 
'standalone' (see http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-xml/#sec-rmd). +

Received on Sunday, 3 April 2005 00:38:22 UTC