Problems with xmlns parts in XPointer

I know it's past last call, but I just noticed this and it's a pretty
serious issue. I hope you've already thought about it but just in case
you haven't:

What happens when XPointers with xmlns parts are used in namesapce
well-formed XML documents? In particular how does the namesapce
declaration in an XPointer using xmlns interact with the namespace
declarations defined by xmlns and xmlns:prefix attributes in the XML
document? What if they conflict? Which one wins?

The current draft seems to implicitly say in section 5.2.1 that xmlns
attributes are completely irrelavant; that only xmlns parts can be used
to binds URIs for prefixes found in an XPointer. This seems wrong to me,
but perhaps its consistent.

At the least, I'd like to see more explicit discussion of the meaning of
xmlns attributes with respect to XPointers in the final draft, even if
the semantics and syntax remain as they currently are. 

-- 
+-----------------------+------------------------+-------------------+
| Elliotte Rusty Harold | elharo@metalab.unc.edu | Writer/Programmer |
+-----------------------+------------------------+-------------------+ 
|               Java I/O (O'Reilly & Associates, 1999)               |
|            http://metalab.unc.edu/javafaq/books/javaio/            |
|   http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=1565924851/cafeaulaitA/   |
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|  Read Cafe con Leche for XML News: http://metalab.unc.edu/xml/     |
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Received on Sunday, 3 June 2001 13:46:57 UTC