RE: definition of forward compatible/backward compatible still an open problem [XMLVersioning-41 ISSUE-41]

Could we be a little more helpful by saying something like:

"I1 is compatible with I2 in a language specific manner such that is not 
generalizable.  Often such compatibility requires that the information in 
I1 not replace or contradict any information in I2 (note that, for 
purposes of this finding, the notions of "replacing" or "contradicting" 
information are again language-specific)."

Maybe follow with an example or two showing how, for example, a given 
instance per language L1 would lead you to conclude that a traffic light 
was red, while per L2 it was green (perhaps because the language just 
transfers a 0 or 1 bit, and somebody made the incompatible change of 
reversing the sense of the encoding between L1 and L2). 


--------------------------------------
Noah Mendelsohn 
IBM Corporation
One Rogers Street
Cambridge, MA 02142
1-617-693-4036
--------------------------------------








Dan Connolly <connolly@w3.org>
Sent by: www-tag-request@w3.org
08/24/2007 09:06 PM
 
        To:     David Orchard <dorchard@bea.com>
        cc:     www-tag <www-tag@w3.org>, (bcc: Noah 
Mendelsohn/Cambridge/IBM)
        Subject:        RE: definition of forward compatible/backward 
compatible still an     open    problem [XMLVersioning-41 ISSUE-41]



On Fri, 2007-08-24 at 15:46 -0700, David Orchard wrote:
> Right.  Where do we go from here?  You're not comfortable with the
> current definition for reasons you've stated.  It also sounds like we
> don't have a counter-proposal, and further generating a counter proposal
> could involve a huge amount of time in the way of research.
> 
> Can we weaken the definition and effectively say it's language
> dependent? 
> 
> "I1 is compatible with I2 in a language specific manner such that is not
> generalizable."

That's not a bad idea.

I'm trying to remember if any of the more down-to-earth stuff
in the strategies section depends on these definitions
very strongly. I'll try to think it over.


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

Received on Tuesday, 11 September 2007 04:18:15 UTC