dita — archive

Feature Request: Make tgroup optional w/in table

From: Don Day <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Date: Sat, 03 Mar 2007 04:27:00 -0000

The story seems related to the choice of the OASIS XML Exchange Table Model as the definitive version for DITA. http://www.oasis-open.org/specs/tm9901.html In that default DTD, the content model for table is effectively: ... In the DITA adaptation, the equivalent specialization-enabled declaration is: ... Thus, tgroup effectively remains one or more by inheritance from the Exchange Table Model. Due to the wide use of this model across most XML DTDs that use tables, we are sort of faced with either changing this design uniquely for DITA, or with pushing the Why question back to the framers of the 1999 document. With my DITA specialization hat on, I can see the rationale of your request. With my Chair hat on, I worry what impact such change might have on editor implementations that may have somehow built dependencies on the requiredness of tgroup (ensuring that new tables get a default setup when created, perhaps) in which the relaxation might affect how usability is perceived. Regards, -- Don Day Chair, OASIS DITA Technical Committee IBM Lead DITA Architect Email: [email protected] 11501 Burnet Rd. MS9033E015, Austin TX 78758 Phone: +1 512-838-8550 T/L: 678-8550 "Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?" --T.S. Eliot "W. Eliot Kimber"