[XML-DEV Mailing List Archive Home] [By Thread] [By Date] [Recent Entries] [Reply To This Message] RE: Realistic proposals to the W3C?
Hi Cavre, Cavre said: 1) Create a true "W3C STANDARD". The only thing that happens here is that any "REC" would become a "STANDARD" if and only if the "REC" was widely supported and had been a "REC" for at least 3 years. A perfect example is HTML3.2. This W3C recommendation has been available for 3 years, is widely supported by a number of developmental tools, and can be executed in a wide variety of browsers across multiple platforms. Since there is easily over a million web pages supporting this "REC" I think HTML3.2 has certainly passed real world testing. Now that is certainly a standard. However I would not consider HTML3.0 a standard due to the many problems associated with that particular "REC" and the lack of support by the general public. Didier replies: This is an "a posteriori" matter of fact based on the social acceptance of a recommendation. Let's call this a "de facto" standard. It is barely a mechanism to protect the users. Cavre said: 2) Require all members to support at least one "Standard" completely or the member will lose their voting rights within W3C (but not the seat which the company, organization.... Didier replies: There we go. You have something here that help re-enforce the propagation of a recommendation and thus make it truly implemented in "real" application. Great idea!!! Now the question is: Why is this condition not part of the W3C member's rule? Cavre said: 3) Create a true "W3C Standards Seal of Approval". I wish I could add up the total amount of wasted time trying to develop web pages for the two most used browsers on the market today. Didier replies: You probably mean here conformance test suites. To obtain the stamp of approval the W3C members would have to run the test suite in order to check their implementation conformance to the recommendation. If successful, the vendor may keep its W3C membership and put the W3C logo on their product. Did I got you right? If yes, this is an other mechanism that could help re-enforce conformance and provide a help protect the users. Cavre said: 4) Working Drafts and finial votes (by this I mean "CR" to "REC") should be posted for public view. But not in house discussions about any working draft, "CR" or "REC". Ok clear point here - I feel it's important that Joe the public understand why a company may not support a particular "REC". It does not matter the reason, but I feel we the public should have access to the finial vote (from "CR" to "REC"). Didier replies: I guess this is already the case but it does not re-enforce any good behavior form the W3C members. (2) and (3) does. My take: To keep the W3C membership, and if you ship a free or not free product related to a W3C recommendation, this product has to implement and comply to the recommendation in order for the member to keep his/her membership. This simply means to W3C members "Walk your talk" :-). On the other hand, That good behavior is re-enforced when the product has to go through an acceptance test suite to be stamped as "W3C compliant" and thus have the member to keep his membership. Thus, the user may recognize a "W3C compliant" logo and know that this vendor support the recommendation and thus that the document is potentially able to be interpreted on more than one vendor's solution. This implies a power pattern shift from the vendor to the user. Now the question is: How many members the W3C consortium would have after 2 years if these conditions where the basic requirements? Does the big guys (Sun, Oracle, Microsoft) would still be members? OK Let's finish this on these open questions and let us ask, why these conditions are not there yet. My own opinion is that the W3 consortium has been quite efficient to produce recommendations but not necessarily very efficient to put in place mechanisms to get them implemented (or compliant). In fact, this community seems to be more efficient, as a group, to put some pressure on vendors for conformance. Thus, this group represents the interest of the users, W3C represents the interest of the vendors - the guys financing the W3C. A positive note about W3C. At least now we can debate about a public recommendation. Not long ago we could only buy products and updates. So, now we have to find the right power balance between the interest of the users and those of the vendors trying to make a living. Cheers Didier PH Martin ---------------------------------------------- Email: martind@n... Conferences: xml devcon 2000 (http://www.xmldevcon2000.com) Wireless Summit NY (http:www.pulver.com) xml devcon 2001 London (http://www.xmldevcon2000.com) Book: XML Professional (http://www.wrox.com) column: Style Matters (http://www.xml.com) Products: http://www.netfolder.comProducts: http://www.netfolder.com
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