Editorial: changes since 1.0

This is a formal response from the XML Core WG to your comments on the
Namespaces in XML 1.1 last call working draft.

If we haven't heard from you by the end of Monday December 9th, we
will assume for the purposes of our planned CR request that you have
no objection to our resolution.

Commenter email address: elharo@macfaq.com

> Subject: Editorial: changes since 1.0
> 
> I find it extremely helpful for documents such as this to list the 
> changes since the previous 1.0 version of the specification, 
> generally as an appendix. I suggest such an appendix be added. By my 
> count, there are three major changes since 1.0:
> 
> IRIs are used instead of URIs.
> 
> The default namespace can be unset by using an xmlns="" attribute.
> 
> The prefix xmlns is by definition bound to the namespace name 
> http://www.w3.org/2000/xmlns/.

Summary: accepted

We will add a (short) appendix describing the changes.

> Subject: Re: IRIs everywhere (including XML namespaces)
> 
> 
> A further thought on IRIs based on my experience today trying to add 
> support for them to XOM:
> 
> [...]
>
> One way to alleviate the problems: specs that specify IRIs (or 
> reinvent them as older, pre-IRI specs like XLink do) should include 
> detailed pseudo-code and perhaps actual code for making the 
> conversion to URIs. They should not rely on handwaving about 
> converting strings to UTF-8 and hex encoding certain bytes. The 
> conversion to UTF-8 will be screwed up, repeatedly. We've seen this 
> in many other APIs in the past, not the least of which is the Java 
> class library itself. It is important to warn implementers of the 
> location of the mines in the field they are about to cross.

Summary: rejected

Though we agree that pseudo-code may be useful to remove any doubt
about the IRI-to-URI conversion process, we do not feel that it is
appropriate to include it in the Namespaces spec, particularly since
it does not require processors to perform this conversion.

-- Richard Tobin, Namespaces 1.1 editor

Received on Thursday, 28 November 2002 13:30:58 UTC