Re: How can external organization reference draft W3C specifications

** taking my chair hat off **

Personally I would prefer option 3 below (with option 1 when applicable)

The reason is simple: specs tend to be around for a long time and the  
references inside may not be updated after the initial work. If this  
happens, we end up with some deployments stuck on old versions of a given  
spec.
To mitigate the "moving target" concern I was proposing one of the  
following options (non mutually exclusive):

A. mandate support for at least the version available in date X (but not  
prevent people to move to a newer spec if available). X could be the date  
of publication of the spec that contains the reference.
B. make a generic reference to the specs but "name" the features to  
support. e.g. you could say "support the canvas element as specified in  
[HTML5]"

/g


On Mon, 19 Mar 2012 13:17:42 +0100, Giuseppe Pascale <giuseppep@opera.com>  
wrote:

> Dear W3C Process Community Group chairs and participants,
>
> we (=Web&TV IG chairs and staff contacts) got a liaison letter (attached)
>  from the Open IPTV Forum asking about how they should handle references  
> to
> W3C specifications that are not yet Recommendations.
> The liaison letter lists a set of options (with pro/cons) and ask the W3C
> for advice on how to move forward and how this issue has been addressed  
> in
> other cases.
>
> The Web and TV IG held a telco [2] and had some initial discussion on
> possible options.
> There was no consensus on how to deal with the issue but the following
> options (non mutually exclusive) were mentioned:
>
> 1. For all specs referenced by HTML5, indirectly reference them through
> html5 specification (to avoid inconsistencies in references and reduce  
> the
> number of open ended references)
> 2. Reference dated snapshots
> 3. Reference a generic undated TF version (e.g. as done by EPUB)
>
> (note: the letter also list other options)
>
> In general, the IG participants felt that was important for the W3C to be
> looking into this problem (that is common to many organizations) and
> formulate some policy/best practices.
> That is why I'm fwd this to you.
>
> Do you have any recommendations on this topic or do you think having a
> general policy on this will be in scope of your CG?
>
>
> Regards,
> /g on behalf of the web&tv IG chairs
>
>
> [1] www.oipf.tv
> [2] http://www.w3.org/2012/03/12-webtv-minutes.html
>


-- 
Giuseppe Pascale
TV & Connected Devices
Opera Software

Received on Monday, 19 March 2012 12:22:25 UTC