RE: levels/options considered harmful

In some cases they are evil for interop, in some cases they actually
help interop. 
Optional features are only one particular case of conformance flavors.
Conformance flavors also include:
- Alternative sets of choices (XSLT is an example)
- Adjuncts that are not part of the core functionality (binding to lower
layer protocols)

In any case, they are a requirement for most of the specs, so we have to
deal with them in the guidelines. 

XML is a special case, since it is the base spec for a wide range of
industry standards.

We could add a note:
"Having multiple flavors of conformance may impact interoperability."



-----Original Message-----
From: Dan Connolly [mailto:connolly@w3.org] 
Sent: Thursday, May 16, 2002 7:18 PM
To: www-qa@w3.org
Cc: Dan Connolly; Jim Hendler
Subject: levels/options considered harmful

regarding:

"Guideline 3. Specify flavors of conformance.  "
	-- http://www.w3.org/TR/2002/WD-qaframe-spec-20020515/

That guideline is presented as if different
flavors of conformance have no downside whatsoever.

I don't think that's the case.

"flavors of conformance" are evil. They're
the antithesis of interoperability.

Note design goal 5 of XML:

"The number of optional features in XML is to be kept to the absolute
minimum, ideally zero."

 -- http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-xml#sec-origin-goals

I suggest that should be a design goal of
all W3C specs. Please update qaframe accordingly.

-- 
Dan Connolly, W3C http://www.w3.org/People/Connolly/

Received on Wednesday, 22 May 2002 13:54:31 UTC