Re: Proper sources for cross-references?

On 2015-04-30 14:49, Kostiainen, Anssi wrote:
> Hi Mark,
>
>> On 29 Apr 2015, at 23:27, mark a. foltz <mfoltz@google.com> wrote:
>>
>> The current cross reference database seems to use "bleeding edge" references for things like DOM [1] and WebIDL [2] hosted on GitHub.  This introduces a bit of complexity when editing the spec because some of the definitions for things like DOMException have moved from DOM to WebIDL in the bleeding edge versions, but not the published versions.   And the cross reference for the DOMException definition [3] seems to have gotten stale.
>>
>> Questions:
>>
>> (1) Should we be cross referencing bleeding edge or published versions of specs?
>
> We should be able to reference the bleeding edge specs in Editor's Draft without problems. Later when we enter more stable stages, having unstable references may become an issue.
>
> I'll let Francois expand on the W3C's current take on references.

Just as Anssi says :)

- The group can choose whatever it wants for references in Editor's Drafts and published drafts as long as the spec has not reached the Proposed Recommendation level.
- The current "trend" in groups is to reference bleeding edge specs from drafts, since drafts tend to quickly react to updates made to normative references.
- Before publication as Proposed Recommendation, normative references need to target "stable" published documents. It is good practice to keep an eye on bleeding edge normative references while editing the spec to ensure that they can be converted to stable references and thus avoid running into problems later on.

The following document clarifies the factors used to evaluate normative references:
http://www.w3.org/2013/09/normative-references

These constraints do not apply to informative references.


>
>> (2) If the answer to (1) is "bleeding edge", should we fix up the cross references list (or, better, adopt or sync with one that someone else maintains)?

It's certainly a good idea to fix bugs in the cross-references list if we find some, and to align with a good cross-references list maintained by someone else as much as practical.

Francois.

>
> Thanks,
>
> -Anssi
>
>
>> [1] https://dom.spec.whatwg.org/
>> [2] http://heycam.github.io/webidl/
>> [3] https://dom.spec.whatwg.org/#domexception
>>
>>
>

Received on Thursday, 30 April 2015 21:15:25 UTC