Minutes

[Kimbro Staken]

Trent Shipley wrote:
> 
> If there were a DTD the line would not be valid since there are typos.  It
> should read:

Even without a DTD it is still not well formed and won't parse by an XML
parser. 

> 
> <item depends_on='OldBusiness.LegalAdvisors' id='Charter'>Charter</item>
> 
> There is an element with the id of OldBusiness.  It contains an element with
> an id of LegalAdvisors so the phrase:
> 
> depends_on='OldBusiness.LegalAdvisors' should be a valid and unambiguous
> reference.

This is a very legitimate thing to want to do in an XML application
however it isn't something that XML 1.0 says anything about. The
interpretation of the depends_on attribute will be completely up to the
application. 

All XML provides is the mechanism to define the file format and verify
that it conforms to a particular document type. Beyond that you have to
move to other specifications or your own application specific logic.

> 
> (Unfortunately, my understanding is that in XML an 'id' MUST be unique.  I
> don't think XML would support the implied scoping for name resolution
> implied by this scheme.  If so, its too bad.)

The id/idref mechanism only means something if you have a DTD to define
the attribute as an ID. As it stands in your document all id means is
that you have an attribute called id and what it semantically means is
completely up to the consuming application. You are correct though that
a DTD defined id attribute must be unique within the entire document and
a corresponding idref can not be scoped like you want. 

> 
> ---------
> 
> I will probably generate several more documents marked up with this sort of
> pseudo-XML before I seriously consider a 0.0.0 attempt at a DTD.

This is a really good use for XML and you don't need a DTD to have a
well formed XML document. Think of the DTD as more like documentation
for the structure of the document and not as a requirement. And please,
please, please don't feel like you need to use any of the "advanced"
features of DTDs. DTDs are an unfortunate holdover from the days of SGML
and really should just die a painful death.

One other suggestion is you should create an XSL-T stylesheet to
transform the XML into something more suitable for human consumption,
i.e. HTML. I can help with this if you want.



-- 
Kimbro Staken
Chief Technology Officer
dbXML Group L.L.C
http://www.dbxmlgroup.com