MEETING MINUTES -- 21 SEPT 2004 -- DITA TECHNICAL COMMITTEE

[Don Day <dond@us.ibm.com>]

MEETING MINUTES -- 21 SEPT 2004 -- DITA TECHNICAL COMMITTEE
*** Please see Action Items and Decision Summary at the end ***


** Agenda **
------------
   1. Roll call

   2. Review/approve minutes from 14 September
       - http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/dita/200409/msg00010.html

   3. Resume discussion on current issues:
       - For the Exchange table model:
           - Feedback/action on @scale usage
           - Feedback on migration mitigation
       - Terminology (awaiting list discussion)
       - Styles for DITA (new issue raised by Don)

   4. DTD cleanup
       - Alignment convention (elements, attributes, comments, etc.)
       - Testing the DTDs and Schemas

   5. Feasibility of a TC F2F?

   6. AOB?

   - Schedule reminder:
       - 17 Aug 2004
               - First major milestone -- complete first draft of
                 first section and send out for review.  
               - Begin review of 1st section.
       - 07 Sep 2004
               - Complete review/revision of 1st section; begin
                 review of 2nd section.
       - 28 Sep 2004
               - Complete review/revision of 2nd section; begin
                 review of 3rd section.  
       - 19 Oct 2004
               - Complete review/revision of 3rd section; beginning
                 of final review
       - 02 Nov 2004
               - Complete final review
       - 16 Nov 2004
               - Release 1.0 spec to OASIS


** Minutes **
-------------
   1. Roll call
         Members: Paul Grosso, Yas Etessam, Mike Wethington, Michael
         Priestley, France Baril, Seraphim Larsen, Indie Liepa, Rob
         Frankland, Sharon Veach, Don Day (10/21--not a quorum)

         Observers and visitors: David Brainard, Erik Hennum, Eric
         Sirois, Tyde Richards, Karl Best, Erik Hickson, Kirsten
         Nothstine

       - No quorum.

   2. Review/approve minutes from 14 September
       - http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/dita/200409/msg00010.html
       - No issues were raised; but we can't formally approve
         because we don't have quorum.

   3. Resume discussion on current issues:
       - For the Exchange table model:
           - Feedback/action on @scale usage
           - Feedback on migration mitigation
               - Someone said there would be no impact for them.
               - Michael Priestley -- He suspects there are lots of
                 migration issues for IBM.  He also has the
                 impression that many of us who are considering
                 using DITA would like to see a @scale attribute.
               - Any other current users?
       - Terminology (awaiting list discussion)
       - Styles for DITA (new issue raised by Don)
           - France -- If people need presentation information,
             couldn't that just be a domain that they add?  
           - Don -- This is something that Paul Grosso also
             suggested.
           - Discussion continued...  This is a thorny problem!
           - Michael's proposal -- To keep the @scale attribute
             (for tables, lines, code examples, etc.) (text).  It's
             hard to migrate legacy docs without it.  But also it's
             just the best way to handle this issue.
           - Don -- Maybe we should keep @scale to handle legacy
             docs, but come up with a new scaling model
             / methodology that's more generally applicable.
           - Paul -- It seems like it's not very well defined.
             This can be a problem, especially for
             interoperability.
           - Don -- Need to finish this discussion later -- let's
             take it to the list.

   4. DTD cleanup
       - Alignment convention (elements, attributes, comments, etc.)
       - Testing the DTDs and Schemas
       - No time, not covered.

   5. Feasibility of a TC F2F?
       - No time, not covered.

   6. AOB?
       - No time, not covered.


** Summary of Decisions **
--------------------------
   - None
       

** Action Required **
---------------------
   017 Shawn Jordan -- Post to the TC list his ideas about general
       extensibility and the creation of new elements not
       necessarily descended from the Topic element. Still open
       (not an immediate deliverable -- for post-1.0).

   021 JoAnn Hackos, Michael Priestley -- Summarize the discussion
       of substitution and post to the TC list. Still pending as of
       7/20/04.

   022 Don, Michael -- Put together a "self-study" tutorial/demo,
       as per JoAnn's comments regarding the DITA sessions. Still
       pending as of 7/20/04.

   036 Shawn Jordan -- Investigate where to point the DITA
       namespace -- where does the URL point? Maybe an OASIS page
       that describes what DITA does, etc.   Still pending 8/17/04.

   040 Don -- Cull the past minutes and discussion list to create
       an inventory of all the things we need to close on in order
       to create the 1.0 spec.  Create a list of these items and
       post it in the Documents area of the website.  >>> This will
       be ongoing.

   042 All -- Consider need for and practicality of 2-3 day
       face-to-face meeting in late October in order to resolve
       final technical issues in advance of final editorial work.
       <<< Let's remove this from the agenda (9/21/04).

   043 Michael Priestley -- Add a straw-man audience statement to
       the introduction.  <<< Still pending as of 9/7/04.

   051 Don Day, 9/7/04 -- Take the discussion of @scale attribute
       and related issues to the list (presentation mechanisms).

   052 Don Day, 9/14/04 -- Is anyone other than IBM actually using
       the scale attribute? Don to ask on dita-users forum; get
       usage info for next week's discussion.

   053 Don Day or Michael Priestley, 9/14/04 -- Ask the IBM tools
       team what they contemplate doing for table migration, and
       whether it can be contributed for all to use. <<< Completed
       as of 9/21/04.

   054 Erik Hennum, 9/14/04 -- Provide a comment about vocabulary
       (terminology discussion) to the list.

   055 Don, 9/21/04 -- Take the @scale discussion to
       the list.


** Issues to be Resolved **
---------------------------
   005 All -- What should the scope and length of the conceptual
       introduction be?  >>> We'll get this from JoAnn.

   006 All -- Should DITA specialization mechanism be documented in
       a separate specification in order to make it easier to use
       in other XML applications that otherwise have no
       relationship to topic-based writing? >>> Ongoing.

   008 Namespace Subcommittee -- Decide namespace issues.  New as
       of 8/31/04.

   009 "Best Practices" document -- Let's put this on the agenda
       for future discussion.

   010 Relationship between DITA and other topic-based
       architectures (such as S1000D) -- Need to incorporate this
       into the "Best Practices" document.

   011 All -- Revisit use of @scale on image (general treatment of
       graphics, ie raster vs vector assumptions, etc.).
       Compare/contrast with controls for the <object> element,
       which in HTML subsumes the <img> element.
   

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