Re: minor naming point

I agree with Mark.  There nothing wrong with xNNy type stuff in our
informal discussions or early drafts but I don't think they
shouldappear in any final documents.

Donald

From:  Mark Bartel <mbartel@thistle.ca>
Resent-Date:  Tue, 14 Sep 1999 12:58:03 -0400 (EDT)
Resent-Message-Id:  <199909141658.MAA23605@www19.w3.org>
Message-ID:  <91F20911A6C0D2118DF80040056D77A2032947@arren.cpu1634.adsl.bellglobal.co
m>
To:  "'Joseph M. Reagle Jr. '" <reagle@w3.org>
Cc:  "''IETF/W3C XML-DSig WG ' '" <w3c-ietf-xmldsig@w3.org>
Date:  Tue, 14 Sep 1999 12:57:44 -0400

>That's what I had responded to my coworker (I have been involved in i18n in
>the past).  However, it "feels inappropriate" to me to use the abbreviation
>in the standard, but as I said I don't feel strongly about it.  My thinking
>is that "c14n" is pretty opaque for somebody who isn't familiar with that
>method of abbreviation, and since there isn't a need to abbreviate we should
>spell it out.  I wouldn't argue anything that you've said.
>
>-Mark Bartel, JetForm
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Joseph M. Reagle Jr.
>To: Mark Bartel
>Cc: 'IETF/W3C XML-DSig WG '
>Sent: 9/14/99 12:43 PM
>Subject: Re: minor naming point
>
>At 11:25 99/09/14 -0400, Mark Bartel wrote:
> >Here's part of a coworker's response to my ftf trip report:
> >
> >> I'm sure this is a picky point, but it took me a long time to figure
>out
> >> that "c14n" was "canonicalization".  Ok, convenient short-hand for
> >> informal communication.  But, it's actually in a tag in the spec,
> >> <c14nalg>.  Yikes!  Yet, we have <transformations> instead of
><t12ns>,
> >> and the fairly ubiquitous term "signature" which could be replaced
> >> with "s7e".  The people who thought this up could probably also save
>a
> >> lot of space/typing my storing only two digits for year values.
> >
> >While I don't feel that strongly on the issue, XML is supposed to be
> >readable.  I don't think the twelve bytes saved per signature are
> >significant enough to warrant the abbreviation.  But then, my favorite
> >applications aren't particularly sensitive to size.
>
>c14n is quite common in the Web community and spreads like a virus once
>people first see it. comes from i18n (internationalization), can be
>generalized for A(X-3)ion words.
>
>_________________________________________________________
>Joseph Reagle Jr.   
>Policy Analyst           mailto:reagle@w3.org
>XML-Signature Co-Chair   http://w3.org/People/Reagle/

Received on Tuesday, 14 September 1999 13:49:38 UTC