RE: !BEHAVIOR

<peter-murray-rust>
4.1 SHOW/EMBED suggests that a tree from a remote document can be
embedded as part of the document in which the XML-LINK appears.  With
ACTUATE="AUTO" this is not a stylesheet mechanism, but a way of
combining components of documents. I have got excited about this, and am
building this feature into CML as it is a useful way of combining
fragments from more than one DTD.  Maybe I'm being naughty in doing
this, but I wouldn't like to be deprived of it.
</peter-murray-rust>

In no way do I want to deprive you of this. On the contrary, I want to
enable this to be done in more powerful, more flexible ways.

The fundamental point is one of _indirection_. If the instruction to
SHOW or ACTUATE in this or that way is an attribute of the element, you
have tied it directly to the link. But the rule as to when, where and
how the linked content should be displayed is not_a _property_
of_the_link. It is one way among others of doing something useful _with_
the link.

As to whether you call it a style or not, I would prefer to call it a
"presentational rule". If you start from the information, rather than
the document, a document can be seen as a particular subset of the
information, preseneted in a certain way. With SHOW="EMBED"
ACTUATE="AUTO", you are saying that the information at the other end of
the link is to be displayed. With different values for these attributes,
it is not to be displayed (or at least, not immediately). To me that is
just as much a matter for a stylesheet, or presentational rule, as
whether or not the text string which is the value of an element's
attribute is displayed on the page (or screen) along with the element's
content.

Whether you call it a stylesheet or not is a secondary issue. You can
call it style, presentation, behaviour, functionality, what you will.
Certainly the choice of name is important, but it is not the main point.
The main point is _indirection_.

Received on Saturday, 14 June 1997 04:17:10 UTC