Re: CURIE proposal ...

> You clearly started with the escalation and seem perfectly happy to  
> continue it endlessly.

I'll skip this and related arguments, since it is not interesting to the
general readership :-)

> > Here is my position on the presentation syntax issue:
> >
> > 1. Ideally, the pres syntax should be a parsable language.
> >    We started with that years ago, but some people were adamantly  
> > opposed.
> 
> Fine.
> 
> > 2. If not 1, then the presentation syntax should be as simple as  
> > possible,
> >    and its primary use should be semantics+examples.
> >    Some simple shortcuts are ok, but they should really be simple  
> > and not
> >    ugly hacks.
> > 3. If possible, use a slightly restricted version of the presentation
> >    syntax to define a real language. Given the experience with 1, this
> >    should be non-normative.
> >    If this discussion opens the eyes of those who were against #1 then
> >    we should go back to 1.
> >    But we no longer have the time for that or #3 in this phase.
> 
> 
> That's fine too. But then there is the fact, I believe, that people  
> won't respect any "don't use this syntax" warnings. Perhaps that's  
> not the worst thing, perhaps it is.

There are no such warnings. Just a statement that it is underdefined.

> There's clearly some interest in the WG (e.g., from Axel) in making the
> presentation syntax a concrete syntax.

As I explained, there is even more than "some" interest in that from the
editors of that same document. But the dynamics of the WG prevented
concretization of that syntax from happening.

I never argued against adding shortcuts to the syntax. I was arguing
against adding bad conventions under the guise of such shortcuts.
Now there is time left only for very small changes and we should not make
hasty decisions that will make irrevocable harm.

> (FWIW, calling it Presentation makes it, in my opinion, even more  
> likely to be treated by people as the human readable syntax. It  
> certainly suggests presentation *to users*.)

Sure, let people use it. I remind that one purpose was to use it to write
the semantics but the other to write examples. The current syntax suits the
first purpose well, but could use improvements to serve the second purpose
better. This is the whole purpose of the curie discussion.


	--michael  


> Cheers,
> Bijan.
> 
>

Received on Tuesday, 22 April 2008 21:07:09 UTC