Re: rewrite of SpecGL Intro

At 02:16 PM 12/16/02 -0500, Lynne Rosenthal wrote:
>>[...]I would suggest to use "class of product (or target)" 
>>immediately.  "The class of product (or target) of this specification 
>>is...".  Highlighting it as a special term (same w/ "scope" above) would 
>>be nice, and a link to a definition or discussion would be useful.
>
>Its a matter of style. If I can figure out how to make it flow, then I'll 
>make the change.

Even though "class of product" is in the subsection header, I think it's 
worthwhile (tho' not critical) to use the phrase in the text.  On of the 
main criticisms of SpecGL was the difficulty of finding the bits that are 
required to ascertain SpecGL conformance.  So ... make it jump out and 
leave no doubt what is the CoP.


>>>Within this Specification Guidelines document, the term "specifications' 
>>>is specifically limited to W3C Technical Reports, even though these 
>>>guidelines could be applied to other documents. The class of product or 
>>>target W3C Technical Report is one that is in-development or being 
>>>revised rather than an existing TR that pre-dates these guidelines. The 
>>>checkpoints in this document are applied and conformance (to this 
>>>document) achieved, as these new specfications are being written. As for 
>>>legacy specifications, they may indirectly comply with the spirit or 
>>>intent of some checkpoint, whichout actually satisfying all requirements 
>>>in those checkpoints.
>>
>>This is the one bit that I disagree with -- I think we had it wrong 
>>before, and it still reflects that (e.g., see [1]).  I don't think that 
>>the class of product is "new TRs".  I think it is TRs.  As you mentioned 
>>at the beginning, there are use cases for legacy TRs ([1] 
>>again).  Therefore, aren't legacy TRs included in the "class of product"?
>
>I guess that is correct.  We did say that the class of products was all 
>TRs.  However, we do need to make a distinction between new TRs that must 
>apply these guidelines and legacy TRs which don't.

The distinction is in the usage scenario (or use case, or user case, or 
whatever we're calling it this week!).  The CoP is all TRs.  There are 
usage scenarios for already-published TRs, and others for in-progress 
TRs.  (For the latter, it is required that they be written to conform to 
SpecGL.)

Actually "must apply these guidelines" is a policy that is written 
elsewhere, and is not in SpecGL itself (yet -- SpecGL could, like I18N, 
decree the policy that all other specs must conform -- we haven't decided 
yet "how" to implement manditoriness).

-Lofton.


>>[1] http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/www-qa-wg/2002Dec/0004.html

Received on Monday, 16 December 2002 17:07:33 UTC