RE: [dita] Bookmap/XNAL repercussions

["Paul Prescod" <paul.prescod@xmetal.com>]

Wouldn't moving XNAL into its own domain be backwards incompatible when
we do it in DITA 1.2?

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Robert D Anderson [mailto:robander@us.ibm.com] 
> Sent: Tuesday, June 20, 2006 12:11 PM
> To: dita@lists.oasis-open.org
> Subject: [dita] Bookmap/XNAL repercussions
> 
> 
> As I make the bookmap changes from today's meeting, I'm also 
> merging it with the other 1.1 prototype files that are 
> available. While doing that, the decision to make XNAL into a 
> domain has demonstrated some side effects.
> 
> The XNAL domain adds one element, authorinformation, as a 
> specialization of <data>. The <data> design has it appearing 
> in many more locations than I had first understood, including 
> inside most other meta elements. This means that, among 
> others, the authorinformation element now shows up inside 
> elements like <source>, <category>, and <platform>.
> 
> I've mentioned before that the XNAL domain will not be useful 
> in topic specializations until domain specialization is 
> enhanced, allowing you to limit where your new element shows 
> up. That enhancement has been talked about for DITA 1.2. I 
> thought that bookmap's constrained model worked around this 
> problem, but it is becoming clear that I was wrong. So, 
> primarily for usability reasons, I would propose the 
> following changes to
> bookmap:
> 
> 1. Do not include authorinformation as a domain. Instead, 
> include it directly in the bookmap as a child of bookmeta.
> 2. Continue to define all of the XNAL elements in a separate 
> module. In DITA 1.2 or DITA 2.0, plan to move XNAL to a 
> domain. This will be easy because it is already maintained in 
> its own module.
> 
> Are there any concerns with this proposal?
> 
> Robert D Anderson
> IBM Authoring Tools Development
> Chief Architect, DITA Open Toolkit
> (507) 253-8787, T/L 553-8787
> 
>