Re: Collisions with identifiers in DOMError.type

On Monday 04 April 2005 18:14, Ray Whitmer wrote:
> On Mon, 4 Apr 2005, Frans Englich wrote:
> > Hello,
> >
> > The changes are high that I have misinterpreted how DOM 3 Core's DOMError
> > should be used, but currently I see that DOMError.typeS could lead to
> > "symbol" collisions, that identifiers implementors chooses for its own
> > purposes can collide with other implementors choices or future
> > developments of DOM.
> >
> > In other words, if for code of mine decides to submit DOMErrorS of type
> > "my-type", how do I know W3C doesn't pick that type name for a future
> > specification, or that a user install software that also happens to use
> > that identifier?
>
> I believe that you do not have any guarantees if you use names similar to
> those currently appearing in the W3C DOM specification.
>
> I believe that the DOM WG did not consider this a major problem because
> solutions recommend themselves quite easily -- use a URI as the type
> string.

Yes, that solves it nicely on the practical level. How locked in thinking one 
sometimes is.

> I think you could be reasonably guaranteed that the W3C DOM or
> successor WG would not choose a URI that belonged to you to define as the
> type string for some extension to the DOM specification.  This would seem
> to be superior to adding a URI field, because the user only has to check
> one field instead of two, and the common W3C types still work as simple
> identifiers -- some might feel that the W3C spec should have used and
> specified URIs, but that ship has sailed.  I realize that it might make an
> implementer uncomfortable, in the absence of a specification saying "use
> URIs", to use URIs because they do not look like the specification's
> identifiers, but just take the moral high-ground and use them anyway.  It
> is not like it is without precedent to use URIs as identifiers in XML APIs)
>
> I could have missed something, too.

Yes, one always find  potential improvements -- but first afterwards.

Apparently this in area which could have been better, as now concluded 
afterwards(DOMError.type should be in URI syntax). Unfortunately, I don't see 
how this can be fixed in later versions, without breaking backwards 
compatibility. The ship has sailed as you say.

Thank you for your reply, I now know how to proceed in my particular case.


Cheers,

		Frans


Frans Englich
KDE Developer

Received on Monday, 4 April 2005 19:24:53 UTC