[css3-namespace] what is a "no namespace"

hello,
a comment to the last call of the CSS Namespace spec but actually I 
always wondered a bit if it could be explained a bit more clearly what 
"no namespace" means?

--- another thing first:

While writing this comment I originally had the following thought:

     In XML no namespace means
      1. elements with no prefix and no default namespace in the 
enclosing document/element
      2. elements resetting a default namespace defined in the enclosing 
document/element with::
	
	<x xmlns="">...

Using this simple logic it would be allowed to define::

	@namespace empty "";

to select element x from above with::

	empty|x

But in XML the empty string is not allowed when defining a namespace 
with a prefix (http://www.w3.org/TR/xml-names/#iri-use), only when 
defining the default namespace (if I understand 
http://www.w3.org/TR/xml-names/#defaulting right).

So the above should not be valid in CSS either I guess?
The syntax does not prevent this though and no comment is there either 
(maybe I overlooked it?).

---

Anyway, I also think the term "no namespace" should be more explicit. In 
an very old draft 
(http://www.w3.org/1999/06/25/WD-css3-namespace-19990625/#tag-selector) 
I found the sentence:

	The namespace component may be left empty to indicate that the selector 
is only to match elements with no declared namespace

Maybe the single word "declared" could be re-added to 
http://www.w3.org/TR/css3-namespace/#css-qnames to make this clearer?


I hope this issue had not come up before, I could not find anthing via G...

thanks,
Christof

Received on Saturday, 16 February 2008 21:55:51 UTC