[Bug 4682] Attribute based reference schemes

http://www.w3.org/Bugs/Public/show_bug.cgi?id=4682

           Summary: Attribute based reference schemes
           Product: SML
           Version: unspecified
          Platform: PC
        OS/Version: Windows XP
            Status: NEW
          Severity: normal
          Priority: P2
         Component: Core
        AssignedTo: cmsmcq@w3.org
        ReportedBy: sandygao@ca.ibm.com
         QAContact: public-sml@w3.org


Should SML allow attribute based reference schemes?

SML currently uses xsi:nil="true" as an indication for "this reference has no
value". In XML Schema, xsi:nil only controls whether an element has any child
content, and does *not* control whether the element carries attributes or not.

As a consequence, if a reference schema uses attributes, e.g.

<my:myRefElement sml:ref="true" my:reference="location" xsi:nil="true"/>

then the xsi:nil based approach to determine whether a reference is nil is not
reliable. We need to decide whether we want to support attribute based schemes.
If we do, we can't rely on xsi:nil for nil references.
whether we should require reference pointers be children.

Received on Thursday, 21 June 2007 15:59:33 UTC