Re: Use cases

>Is there a local Microsoft XML weenie here? 

There are several Microsoft XML people here. <grumble>Should I get offended,
or not?</grumble>

>'software' is awfully vague, and doesn't tell me which 'weenie'. I've never

>seen this behavior in my uses of Microsoft's XML tools, but it may just be 
>that I haven't wandered into the right pasture. 

The main scenarios that I am aware of is to refer to inline XDR schemas and
inline XSLT function extension mechanisms. The schema references may be
hand-authored or generated by some of the XML and ADO XML database tools.
Both scenarios do not care about the actual string value but are used for
resolution. However, see below!

>Also: has anyone else (non-MS) done this? 

The issue is not really an MS issue. The issue is that a relatively old rec
exists that requires literal interpretation of namespaces for equality. Any
change to this interpretation, in particular introducing additional
processing of namespace uris to determine equality will break current
documents and their processing. While we as tool implementors have control
over the tools we write, we do not have control over our customers'
documents.

In general retroactive spec changes would be acceptable "if possible",
namely: 

1. retroactive changes have virtually no impact on the conformance of
existing documents (e.g. loosen constraints, not tighten), 
2. retroactive changes can be introduced by vendors with minimal customer
disruption, 
3. that changes larger than these employ a versioning mechanism, 
4. that a new version have compelling feature benefits to drive adoption by
vendors and customers. 

In the specific case being considered, none of these conditions appear to
obtain, and thus changes to the NS recommendation should not be considered
as a possible option.

Note that a versioning of the XML Namespace spec may be acceptable if done
right. However, there are other issues associated with that.

Best regards
Michael "Weenie" Rys 

PS: My apologies for answering this late, but I am at WWW9 and reading mail
once or twice a day at most.

Received on Tuesday, 16 May 2000 21:29:46 UTC