RE: Hypermedia - Why

 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: David Carlisle [mailto:davidc@nag.co.uk] 
> Sent: July 25, 2012 10:50
> To: public-xmlhypermedia@w3.org
> Subject: Re: Hypermedia - Why
> 
> On 25/07/2012 15:36, Rushforth, Peter wrote:
> > I think the answer may be that there isn't one.  However, in 
> > application/something+xml, you may have a good definition 
> of something 
> > (somewhere) and the +xml will convey the meaning of the links and 
> > their attributes.
> 
> but if you only understand the links on a per-language basis 
> there is not much to be gained (and something to be lost) in 
> using a shared markup for links and nothing else.
> 
> The XHTML2 designers flat refused to use prefixed attributes 
> for linking in XHTML2.
> With good reason they wanted href=... rather than xml:href= 
> or xlink:href=.

Did they not want the colon, or the namespaces?  Because as I recently
learned, colons do not imply namespaces, and xml: is usable by
non-namespace aware xml processors.

> The designers of any other language are likely to do 
> likewise. I suspect that I could predict with some accuracy 
> that if xml:href were standardised MathML for example 
> wouldn't use it as it has several different uses of URI 
> distinguished by attribute name.
> MathML uses
> 
> href=""
> altimg=""
> cdgroup=""
> src=""
> definitionURL=""
> 
> These all have a defined meaning in _MathML_ and nothing 
> would be gained (and those meanings would be lost) if one or 
> more of them were changed to use xml:href.

In the spec I was reading, definitionURL says that it is a URI to a CD.
What language is the dictionary available in?  What format?

I can see that in application/mathml+xml there is an definition 
of their meaning.  But what about a composite
document which encloses some mathml and some mapml, say.  Should I use
@href, @src from the MathML definition?  Or use xlink:href?  OK, there is
no xlink:src.


> 
> I know something about MathML which is why I use it as an 
> example, but I don't see why editors of other languages would 
> feel any different about the URI attributes in languages that 
> they maintain.

I agree.  I would not force these things on anybody, but they should
be there if you need them.  And if they are there _in the future_, it may
be that language designers (and in XML, isn't that just about everybody)
may decide to use them.

> 
> 
> So I would say that the jury is still out and as yet no 
> example has been shown where an application could use the 
> proposed attributes.

Why is it I feel my feet only touching by their toes?

Peter

Received on Wednesday, 25 July 2012 15:21:41 UTC