Re: inconsistencies between XSL and XLL

Hi Didier,

Didier PH Martin wrote:

> The whole exercice about the stylesheet processing intruction lead me to see
> a certain inconsistency between XLL and the style sheet PI. In the last
> recommendation, the PI is stated as <?xml-stylesheet....?> and was in the
> previous proposal <?xml:stylesheet...?>. 

Yes

> XLL links according to the latest
> posted proposal are expressed as <A xml:link="simple"
> href="http://www.w3.org/">The W3C</A>. Why do we have to kind of notation
> 
> a) xml-stylesheet
> b) xml:link

You are correct on three counts:

1) that it would have been possible to model stylesheet linka\ge using
XLink
2) that it wasn't done that way
3) that there was a reason

Those people who are doing the designing of XML feel that hyperlinks are
first class objects, ie content; wheras stylesheet instructions are not
content and thus should not actually be in the document at all. So
having them as an element is considered very bad. Until out of line
links become a reality, however, the compromise is to use a processing
instruction. [1]


> On based on namespaces and the other on ????. 

? means PI. Namespaces do not apply to PIs, if I recall correctly.

> Is it because W3 want to
> distinguish processing instructions from other kind of markups? 

Yes

> Is the
> implicit rule (but not stated anywhere)
> that xml-something is for processing
> instructions and xml:something is for other stuff like pointers or other
> kind of objects? 

xml:something means something in the xml namespace [2]

> Will W3 publish a paper to clarify this?

It may be useful to read the XLink design principles [3]. 

In general though, having just gone looking for references to back up
whayt I already understand, I agree that, without already knowing the
answer, it is difficult to find it ;-)

This is not an official response of the XML or XLink WGs, just my own
understanding of the situation.

[1] http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-xml
[2] http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-xml-names/
[3] http://www.w3.org/TR/NOTE-xlink-principles

--
Chris


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