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namespace prefixes within attribute values

• From: "Simon St.Laurent" <simonstl@s...>
• To: XML-Dev Mailing list <xml-dev@x...>
• Date: Thu, 09 Mar 2000 11:53:51 -0500

Both the XML Schemas drafts and the XLink drafts use namespace prefixes
within attribute values.  As far as I can tell, this usage isn't sanctioned
by the Namespaces in XML Recommendation.

For XML Schemas, we get things like: 
<xsd:simpleType name="myString" base="xsd:string">

For XLink, we have:
<xls xlink:type="extended" xlink:role="xlink:extended-linkset">

I'm not sure I can recommend this kind of usage as best practice.  Among
other things, it isn't clear that applications - which should be processing
these attribute values - will ever get the prefix information, given some
strongly held beliefs that prefixes are throwaway info for the parser only.
 At the same time, the Namespaces spec doesn't tell parsers that they
should examine attribute values for namespace prefixes.  (There's no
warning about using colons within attribute values in XML 1.0, either.)

I'm quite aware that both of these specs are probably too far gone for this
critique to have an impact on their development, but I think this issue
merits further examination, perhaps in the context of an extension or
revision of Namespaces in XML.

Simon St.Laurent
XML Elements of Style / XML: A Primer, 2nd Ed.
Building XML Applications
Inside XML DTDs: Scientific and Technical
Cookies / Sharing Bandwidth
http://www.simonstl.com

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