Re: do we have to use local-biblio for same-day publications?

On 13/09/2013 15:19 , Sandro Hawke wrote:
> What the best way to publish N documents that refer to each other, where
> N > 1?    Should we use local-biblio while preparing the drafts, then
> after publication move those local-biblio entries into specref?   Or
> should we put speculative stuff into specref, so for a few days before
> publication, everyone's drafts will have a reference to a TR that
> doesn't exist yet (and might end up never existing, if the publication
> date changes)?

At least given the current status of things, I think that using 
localBiblio for that sort of case is best. Otherwise things might break.

> I suppose, in theory, respec or specref could notice that it's
> speculative (since the date of publication is in the future) and only
> use that reference under certain condition -- some kind of "I'm
> preparing this document" flag.   One can imagine these speculative
> reference could be added w3c-wide whenever the webmaster gives out a
> publication date.

I think there are a few issues here:

   1) is that this sounds a bit complicated. I mean it's implementable, 
but it does add some complexity for something that's a bit of a corner 
case (I know one or two groups do this sort of parallel publication 
regularly, but most never do it at all).

   2) ReSpec could support this, but it's not the only customer. So it 
would have to be in specref.

   3) If you give specref a "give me speculative references" flag it may 
easily end up giving you speculative references *other* than those in 
the list of documents you are preparing. You could get broken references 
out of this.

   4) It is not uncommon for specifications to be published not exactly 
on the announced date of publication. For instance, you might have 
picked a date and placed all the stuff in TR, but for whatever reason 
the webmaster couldn't do it (of course it's *your* fault; the webmaster 
is always right). Your documents will get published with the next slot 
but at the initially planned date. No automated system can actually know 
that easily.

So all in all... I reckon localBiblio ain't all that bad :) *OR* 
reference the latest version (or the ED) instead of a dated version. 
You're always good that way.

> On a related subject, is specref automatically updates with every w3c
> (and ietf?) publication, or does it have to be updated by hand after
> each publication?

Last I looked Tobie had to run a script, but it updated publications 
automatically.

-- 
Robin Berjon - http://berjon.com/ - @robinberjon

Received on Friday, 13 September 2013 14:08:00 UTC