- From: Arnold, Curt <Curt.Arnold@hyprotech.com>
- Date: Thu, 15 Jul 1999 10:28:25 -0600
- To: "'Ronald Bourret'" <rbourret@ito.tu-darmstadt.de>, "'XML Dev'" <xml-dev@ic.ac.uk>
- Cc: "'www-xml-schema-comments@w3.org'" <www-xml-schema-comments@w3.org>
And to actually respond to the initial question instead of rambling. There is not a mechanism in the current XML Schema Working Group Grafts to specify the units for a particular data type, though I would assume that that could be included in the textual description of the data type that should come when they address documentation elements (which was a to be addressed issue in the first draft). Something like <datatype name="velocity"> <basetype name="real"/> <description> This datatype represents a unit expressed in meters per second. </description> </datatype> I definitely do not think that it should be up to the XML parser to try to make sense of a string like "300 mph" and come up with an SI value. I have expressed in a message on the XML Schema email archive (sorry don't have URL, dated July 1 with the subject "Datatype comments") a desire to have a mechanism to associate a data type with extended information that might include unit related information. If unit information was to be included in schemas, it would only be used by documentation engines and applications, not by parsers. I'd see something like <datatype name="velocity"> <basetype name="real"/> <!-- this element says that element is expressed in the unit with this url. If you interpreted the URL, you could get to the other units that could be used to render the value to the user --> <unitRef href="#ms-1"/> <description> This datatype represents a unit expressed in meters per second. </description> </datatype> If this is thought to be a reasonable and desirable addition to schemas, I wouldn't mind putting together a message on the dimensional units schema that I use.
Received on Thursday, 15 July 1999 12:30:34 UTC