[whatwg/dom] Trouble understanding a parable of specification, under the "ensure pre-insertion validity" list of steps (#870)

Under point 6 of the [list of steps to take to "ensure pre-insertion validity"](https://dom.spec.whatwg.org/#concept-node-ensure-pre-insertion-validity), as part of an attempt to implement a procedure involving the particular list of steps, I am having trouble unambiguously interpreting the following statament:

> parent has an element child, child is a doctype, or child is non-null and a doctype is following child.

The test described by the statement is only effective if the node is an element, as evidenced by text prior to the quote above. However, I am unsure if the boolean statement above means "parent has an element child _and_ child is a doctype, or child is non-null and a doctype is following child." or if it could mean "parent has an element child, _or_ child is a doctype, or child is non-null and a doctype is following child.". Implementing the procedure, proper interpretation, as you might imagine, is absolutely critical.

I am asking whether the sentence be re-worded to remove the kind of difficulty I am experiensing, if I am on to anything here. Alternatively, perhaps there is a "how to read the specification"-kind of document somewhere, which explains how to interpret these kind of linguistic statements? I consider myself well versed in English, but feel free to point out if this is a mistake I am making somewhere.

There may be other statements where this kind of ambiguity surfaces, the one quoted above was just an example, and happens to be the one I am practically involved with.

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Received on Thursday, 11 June 2020 16:14:53 UTC