Closure (was Re: typo/bug in the namespace spec)

----- Original Message -----
From: "Tim Bray" <tbray@textuality.com>
To: <xml-uri@w3.org>
Sent: Saturday, June 10, 2000 6:09 PM
Subject: Re: typo/bug in the namespace spec


> I believe that the consensus was that the rec means exactly what it says,

I've certainly gotten the impression from the last month of this discussion
that the Namespace WG carefully considered all the alternatives and chose
the most useful and least disruptive option.  Others continue to disagree.

The W3C *has* to bring this to closure, and very soon.  It's only a matter
of time until we have a slow news week and the mainstream trade press puts
out the  story "Web standards body paralyzed by arcane religious warfare"
for the general amusement of the industry.  That will do nobody on this
mailing list any good.

Now that we have quite thoroughly educated ourselves on the nuances of the
Namespace Recommendation and the URI RFC, and thoroughly flogged various
dead horses, I suggest a poll so that the W3C Director and membership can
see where the attentive public on this issue stands. Here's a very rough
first cut at the questions that I'd like to see the distribution of opinion
on:

1 - Should the Namespace Recommendation be CLARIFIED to better explain its
authors' intent or CHANGED to be more consistent with "web standards" such
as the URI RFC?

2a - If CLARIFIED, what about XPath/XSLT and RDF?  ALIGN them with XML
Namespaces or LAYER their own semantics that are different?

2b- If CHANGED, should URIs be "absolutized" or relative URIs forbidden?

3 - Do you believe that there is any hope for a compromise solution that
would, for example, allow absolutization with strict constraints about the
base URI and/or changes to the relevant RFCs? YES or NO?

4 - Is any purpose served by continuing this mailing list beyond the time
necessary to tidy up the loose ends from the poll? YES or NO.

(FWIW, I vote 1:CLARIFIED, 2a:LAYER, 3:NO, 4:NO)

I'm fully aware that the W3C Director is by no means bound to resolve this
in a way consistent with majority opinion, but I *really* want to know where
people stand.  And I really Really REALLY want to put this behind us.

As soon as humanly possible.

Received on Saturday, 10 June 2000 20:04:56 UTC