- From: Stefan Ram <ram@ZEDAT.FU-Berlin.DE>
- Date: Fri, 8 Aug 2003 04:26:56 +0200
- To: www-html@w3.org
Bottom-up Sections Abstract: The definition elements dt and dd should be replaced by a more general "bottom-up section" element with a "title" and a "contents". In several types of texts certain "small sections" appear, which do not fit into the XHTML 2 section scheme. For example, in articles, sometimes there are "boxes" treating certain topics or, in mathematics texts, there are labeled theorems or proofs. Such a proof can not be easily implemented using the XHTML 2 section element, because its "level" then would depend on the level of the containing section, while it should always be the same "low" level - independent of whether it is part of a section or a chapter. The best approximation might be to use a definition list for it, where a name like "proof 2.14" is the definition term and the text is the definition description. But using a definition list for this case seems somewhat abusive because a proof is not a definition and a proof is not a list. A pair of dt and dl elements can be regarded as a definition, but this definition pair lacks orthogonality: Why must it always be part of a list? Why do we have such a pair for a definition but not for a resource description or a picture caption? So one might consider to replace the dt-dl-pair by a more general element: The "bottom-up section" ("bos"). Its "level" does not derive from the level of the containing section but from the level of the contained sections, therefore the name "bottom-up". It consists of * a title (like the definition term) * a contents (like the definition description) * an optional role-attribute for the title (like, e.g., "dt") * an optional role-attribute for the contents (like, e.g., "dd") It may also appear where a list item may appear in an ordered or unordered list, therefore a definition list can now be built using the bottom-up section element and one of the list elements, like the following unordered list of definitions. (A list containing only a certain type of elements can be marked as such using the containsonly-attribute.) <ul containsonly="definitions"> <bos isa="definition"> <title role="dt">Flower</title> <contents role="dd">The reproductive part of a plant</contents> </bos> </ul> But such a definition-bos might as well be used outside of a list, where ever a paragraph might appear. Some values of the attribute "isa" and the attribute "role" should be standardized, like a caption-picture-role, so that the element might be used as a picture-caption-pair, as follows <bos isa="titled picture"> <title role="caption">A Flower</title> <contents role="picture"><object .../></contents> </bos> CSS should be extended so as to allow to specify, where the caption appears in relation to the contents (e.g., above or below). A proof then might be written as follows. <bos isa="proof"> <title>3.12</title> <contents>(Left as an exercise to the reader.)</contents> </bos> An FAQ-list as follows. <ol containsonly="FAQ-entries"> <bos isa="FAQ-entry"> <title role="question">What is a Flower?</title> <contents role="answer">The reproductive part of a plant</contents> </bos> </ol> The possible values for the attributes "containsonly", "isa" and "role" should be standardized, a generic use is possible for cases not part of the standard by using the class-attribute as in <bos class="exercise-question"> <title>Flowers</title> <contents>What is a flower?</contents> </bos> Some types of sections might have multiple possible contents-roles: <bos class="book description"> <title role="book title">Flowers</title> <contents role="book ISBN">0-937383-18-X</contents> <contents role="book description">It is about flowers.</contents> </bos> Some examples of applications include * A definition with a term and a description * A titled picture with a caption and a picture * A description of a book or other resource * A text type (isa) such as - a proof - a theorem - an example - a warning/caveat - an abstract, a conclusion - a comment - a listing - a BNF production - a background information - an exercise -- http://purl.net/stefan_ram/pub/
Received on Thursday, 7 August 2003 22:33:22 UTC