- From: Larry Masinter <masinter@adobe.com>
- Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2012 18:10:27 -0800
- To: "C. M. Sperberg-McQueen" <cmsmcq@blackmesatech.com>
- CC: "www-tag@w3.org" <www-tag@w3.org>
What is too complex and ultimately wrong is to give options to those writing specs that make references. "loose bindings" can't be automatic, because there is no way to control, But normative references should not automatically require updating the referencing spec; if there are incompatible changes, then the update might be made by publishing an applicability statement instead, though. All references should be (a) dated, versioned editions in the link (b) by default, all references are "loose bindings", without any explicit disclaimer. To confirm that a reference is appropriate, W3C working groups could be encouraged to publish applicability statements, e.g.: "Working group finding: Spec A is still valid with B.v1 replaced with B.v2 and C.v1 replaced with C.v3 (except note that referenced section 3.6 in C.v1 is now found in section 7 of C.v3)."
Received on Wednesday, 18 January 2012 02:12:54 UTC