Issue 92 - 92.3 - Allow BPEL specified elements and attributes tobe extended - Proposal For Vote

["Yaron Y. Goland" <ygoland@bea.com>]

Section 6.3 of the specification current states that extensions must not 
change the semantics of attributes and elements in BPEL. This rather 
defeats the point of allowing extensions, especially of the mandatory 
variety, whose purpose in life is often to change the semantics of 
things in BPEL. In practice the current restriction isn't enforceable 
since there really is nothing to stop someone from introducing an 
extension that changes existing BPEL semantics. But as a general rule I 
think it's good to avoid unenforceable rules and instead provide 
actionable guidance. With that in mind I propose:

Section 6.3

From: Extensions MUST NOT change the semantics of any element or 
attribute from the WS-BPEL namespace.

To: Extensions that change the semantics of elements or attributes in 
the WS-BPEL namespace MUST either be backwards compatible with the 
definitions provided in this specification or MUST be declared as a 
mandatory extension. See section 13.7 for information about mandatory 
extensions.

        Thanks,

                 Yaron