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Re: Re: [namespaceDocument-8] 14 Theses

• To: XML DEV <xml-dev@l...>
• Subject: Re: Re: [namespaceDocument-8] 14 Theses
• From: Ronald Bourret <rpbourret@r...>
• Date: Thu, 21 Feb 2002 00:37:54 -0800
• References: <B899D7E0.F235%patrick.stickler@n...>

Patrick Stickler wrote:

> The problem is that even if namespaces corresponded to
> single vocabularies (and I don't think they do) vocabularies
> do not correspond to single document models and programmers
> really are concerned with document models, not vocabularies.

Yep.

> From a programming perspective, I see namespaces as irrelevant.
> They're just punctuation that provides globally distinct names.
> It's the context of how those names are used that matters, and
> that depends on doctypes, content models, etc.

Yep again.

> Stylesheets may reference elements and attributes by name,
> but context is critical, and one crafts stylesheets by document
> model, not by vocabulary. If a stylesheet is shared across
> a vocabulary, it is only because all the content models
> are compatable but introduce an incompatable content model
> and you'll quickly specialize stylesheets accordingly.

And again.

> But the namespace itself is not, and should not, be required nor
> expected to bear the semantic and functional significance that
> you seem to expect from it.

And again.

> Nevertheless, as I stated above, a namespace URI is a convenient
> point of intersection for referring to and describing such
> related resources, and a namespace document could be a reasonable
> interim solution for providing access to such knowledge.

Exactly. If you view RDDL as a pragmatic way of letting humans access
resources at design time, it works. If you view it as a way help you
process documents at run time, it doesn't.

-- Ron

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