- From: <noah_mendelsohn@us.ibm.com>
- Date: Mon, 20 Jan 2003 18:46:15 -0500
- To: www-archive@w3.org
This email was originally sent to a limited distribution, and is being sent to the www-archive for public access. Noah To: "Champion, Mike" <Mike.Champion@SoftwareAG-USA.com> From: "Noah Mendelsohn" <Noah_Mendelsohn@us.ibm.com> cc: "''C. M. Sperberg-McQueen' '" <cmsmcq@acm.org>, "'David Orchard '" <dorchard@bea.com>, "'fallside@us.ibm.com '" <fallside@us.ibm.com>, "Champion, Mike" <Mike.Champion@SoftwareAG-USA.com> Subject: RE: The Web Services Architecture WG position on XML profiling/su bset ting This note is a collective response to some of the replies I've received to the Tag note posted at [1]. I don't want to belabor this, but I've gotten some well-considered replies, all of which were either private to me or sent to this cc: list. None were sent to Tag. I've learned some things from these responses, and they've somewhat clarified my thinking. So, at the risk of unnecessarily dragging this on, here's a clarification of my original concern, and a response to at least some of the specific points I've seen raised in feedback. BTW: I have no problem at all with this note or my others being forwarded to the Tag list, as long as enough is forwarded to give accurate context. First of all, Mike hints that I may not have read all of his note carefully enough. As he suggests, I don't think that's the whole problem or even most of it, but it may have contributed some. So, apologies if that's happened. Clarification of my Original Concern ------------------------------------ I realized as a result of recent correspondence that I have some assumptions about the Tag and W3C process that others may not entirely share. I view the Tag as essentially a senior executive body in W3C. I see it's role as being to help the Workgroups succeed at what they do, and very occasionally to directly tackle certain issues with scope so broad and architectural that doing it "at the top" seems to make sense (what a URI references strikes me as one of those issues that it's reasonable for the Tag to discuss directly.) I see it's role as being like the CTO or associated executive technical committee in a corporation. I and others have benefitted from that fact that the Tag seems to welcome informal input and discussion from almost anyone in the community. I think that's great. On the other hand, I think one wants a much more formal relationship when a workgroup provides formal input to the Tag. I think that in such cases the workgroup should have a responsibility to proceed cautiously, check pertinent facts, and within reason coordinate with other workgroups that may already have explored the pertinent issues. Consider a technical team in a large company dealing with its senior management or CTO. Sure, they may talk informally in the hall, but if the team approaches the CTO or his/her technical committee and says "we have formal input for you on an issue", then it's assumed that they've done all reasonable coordination and research on the topic before going "up that high". The essence of my concern was a perception that in failing to do this, WSA actually misinformed the TAG about several points of fact (see below) . I thought it also implied to the TAG a consensus in the WSA/SOAP community that was in fact never explored outside of WSA. Maybe some confusion comes because others don't share my view of how the Tag/WG relationship should work, or maybe it's because WSA though they were being sufficiently careful and I didn't see it. Anyway, that was my concern. I infer that WSA may think that the substantial membership overlap with XMLP and WSDL WGs mitigates the need for formal coordination. I disagree. The fact that there is some shared membership between the groups is a good thing...but it means nothing officially. In W3C every member of a WG has equal standing and should have equal opportunity to engange in coordination activites with other groups. I guess I have particularly high expectations for WSA, which is in some sense a mini-TAG for the WS area. It whould be particular careful to work with and through the other groups in the WS area, I think. Anyway, I think that's the big picture as I see it. Rightly or wrongly, that's where my concerns came from. I don't propose to pursue them further unless the Tag finds that helpful (if more discussion springs up on the Tag list...I may forward this note as a clarification of my intent. Given that things are quiet, I'd prefer to let it go. DaveO: you certainly have my permission to forward this note to other Tag members if you feel that would be helpful.) Responses to Particular Points ------------------------------ This is a long note already, but I thought it might be helpful to list the particular points I think I've seen in various responses, and to give a quick reaction. I've done this without attribution: >> You might not have read the original WSA note carefully. As noted above, possibly true. If so, I apologize. I might change some emphasis in my note, but I think the overall concerns above remain for me. >> Yeah! this needed saying, thank you! You're welcome. >> You're off base, and your tone was inappropriate. I hope not, but if so I do apologize. It was not my intention to be inflamatory. >> Asking groups to check with each other before providing fomral input to TAG adds too much process overhead. I respectfully disagree. I'm not talking about an n-squared process here. The WSA note specifically made proposals about SOAP and Schema. In each case, WSA was commenting on areas that had been discussed in depth by the respective workgroups over a period of time. I think that WSA would have done the Tag a much greater service by ping'ing the WGs first, and either arranging for joint approach to the Tag by the WGs together (we've gotten together, learned from each others' previous work, and at least can outline the alternatives) or failing that to at least say "we can tell you not only that there is division in our WSA group, but that the schema WG has found the question of schema subsets to be a subtle one involving difficult tradeoffs of simplicity vs. interop...we in WSA have not done a full analysis of those tradeoffs" (or whatevery you believe to be the correct summary.) >> If WSA missed a technical point on SOAP, it must be subtle. This is (maybe) proven by the fact the significant cross membership between the teams didn't serve to get it right. You be the judge. The SOAP CR [1] has in its table of contents: 3.1.5.1 id Attribute Information Item 3.1.5.2 ref Attribute Information Item 3.1.5.3 Constraints on id and ref attribute information items The first two of these merely state that the respective attributes are allowed. The entire text of the third section is: "The value of a ref attribute information item MUST also be the value of exactly one id attribute information item. A ref attribute information item and an id attribute information item MUST NOT appear on the same element information item." The WSA note says that "One issue that SOAP 1.2 "punts" on (as do some other W3C specifications, including DOM Level 2 and XSLT) is the question of how an "id" attribute is defined in the absence of a DTD and without insisting on a schema processing step." I don't think this is subtle. I think the WSA group missed it, and if anything this demonstrates some of the risks in assuming that cross-membership is an appropriate foundation for cross group coordination. It also suggests that members of the WSA did not look hard at the SOAP rec in making their proposal. For an informal note among team members, I think this is fine. It happens all the time. As I said in my intro I think it's constructive to go for a higher standard when the Tag receives formal input from a workgroup. My assumption is that the Tag is indeed too busy to read all the specs themselves. I therefore fear that the TAG might take too seriously when a seemingly-authoritative source educates the Tag that "the XMLP group 'punted'". This was one of the sources of the somewhat pointed tone of my note, and of the request for a formal "withdrawal." >> The original WSA note and some later responses refer to a SOAP profile. FWIW, I think the XMLP response (which admittedly I had a big hand in drafting) goes to some length to indicate that XMLP is not defining a profile of XML in SOAP. I don't think I'm defining an XML profile when I invent an XML vocabulary for employee records, and I don't think we did in SOAP either. Thus, even though WSA was going to some trouble to endorse the findings by XMLP, it then in a sense misquoted them. That also upset me. It might also lead the TAG to mistakenly believe that XMLP has consenus that it defined a profile. I do agree that the constraints imposed by SOAP on its use of XML might be inspiration for a profile, were an XML profile to be a worthy goal. Again, if WSA had first checked with the very group for which it helps set architecture, it would have uncovered some of these sensitivites...certainly from me, and perhaps from others. I think the input to the Tag would have benefitted. >> We need a profile because generic tools may not produce the subset of XML that SOAP uses. I am less convinced than others that SOAP's experiences are much of a justification for a subset profile, but that's a good discussion that should be aired. It's surely not consensus from XMLP (since I am on XMLP and I would disagree at this point). If it's consensus from WSA then it's fine for WSA to say so to TAG. My concern is the one just above; SOAP itself does not define a profile IMO. One might or might not decide that it's inspiration for a profile. The WSA note implied that SOAP had already defined a profile that might be used by others. The XMLP group never considered that question one way or the other, as I remember. >> The Tag needs to do this work and WSA is just trying to help. Actually, as I responded privately to Dave, I think the XML subset question belongs in the XML core workgroup. I strongly disagree with Tag taking over design responsibilities from WGs that have been chartered in one or another area by the W3C membership. I think it is appopriate for Tag to do technical fact finding, which in part is what they're doing. I would prefer for the subset issue to relatively rapidly sent to core. If core has doubts about working on this, then Tag should use whatever mechanisms are provided in the W3C process to ask the membership to clarify core's charter and responsibilities. If feel the same way about xml:id, by the way. >> You should have responded to WSA, not TAG. As noted above, my concern was (1) that the TAG had been misinformed in several respects and (2) that this resulted from a breakdown in process that was in the end the Tag's responsibility (I.e. to decide what sort of work it wants its WGs to do before providing formal input.) If the WSA note had not itself already gone to the TAG, I would certainly have preferred to come to consensus with WSA first. Rightly or wrongly, I felt it as important to communicate my concerns to the Tag and tag list readers as to WSA. I hope you'll forgive the long spiel above. I really would rather not churn on this much more. Indeed, I am essentially incommunicado Tues-Fri, which means I'll only be doing top-prioirty email until middle of next week. So, I'd be glad to let this go. You and the Tag have my input, and I hope it's helpful. You also have my apologies for anything that is either in error or unduly inflamatory. I would encourage the TAG and the WG chairs to think about the process issues. Thank you. [1] http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/www-tag/2003Jan/0216.html [2] http://www.w3.org/TR/2002/CR-soap12-part2-20021219/ ------------------------------------------------------------------ Noah Mendelsohn Voice: 1-617-693-4036 IBM Corporation Fax: 1-617-693-8676 One Rogers Street Cambridge, MA 02142 ------------------------------------------------------------------
Received on Monday, 20 January 2003 18:47:38 UTC