> -----Original Message-----
> From: Mary McRae [mailto:] On Behalf Of Mary McRae
> Sent: Friday, September 28, 2007 08:56
> To: 'Alessandro Triglia'; 'Lee Tincher'
> Cc: 'Dwarkanath, Sukumar';
> Subject: RE: [emergency] HAVE comments - explicitly
> identifying the normative parts in the data dictionary
>
> I'm afraid that you've read much more into my note than was intended.
>
>
>
> Here the language from the TC Process:
>
> All schema and XML instances, whether by inclusion or by
> reference, including fragments of such, must be well formed.
> All expressions must be valid. Each schema and XML instance
> that is part of the specification must be delivered in its
> own separate plain text file.
>
>
>
> The intent is that oftentimes errors occur when
> cutting/pasting schemas into a document - characters may be
> transposed to other symbols, bits lost, etc. It's also
> extremely difficult for an end user to set up their
> environment if they have to cut/paste the schema out of a
> word processing document or worse, a PDF. So the thing that
> is actually parsable is the normative version, if there is
> one. Note that the DITA TC produces its specification in both
> DTD and XSD formats - the DTD version is explicitly declared
> as normative. The TC can always decide that a schema isn't
> normative, but they can't decide that the version of the
> schema printed in the document is normative and the separate
> text file is informational only.
Thanks, Mary.
I still believe that it is very desirable for a standard if a certain
normative provision occurs only once, regardless of the language in which it
is expressed--XML Schema, plain English, or dictionary entries.
I see that OASIS doesn't require this, but I believe it's a very good thing.
Alessandro
