Re: [legalxml-courtfiling] Salt Lake minutes

[Rolly Chambers <rlchambers@smithcurrie.com>]

Title: RE: [legalxml-courtfiling] Salt Lake minutes

The notion of a "simplified" CD 1.1 subset came from the TEILITE DTD (see http://www.tei-c.org/Lite/U5-pref.html) and the Simplified Docbook DTD (see http://www.docbook.org/xml/simple/index.html) as well as the GCAC "Lessons Learned" paper. The GCAC pilot also indicated that there were a number of problems with the XML initially used for the tests (not well-formed, not valid, inconsistent use of some elements and attributes). A simplified court document DTD is one way to reduce the kinds of XML document problems apparently encountered in GCAC testing. However, I don't think we should offer a simplified Court Document DTD if the only rationale is that other DTD's have done something similar.

 

In considering Don and Roger's comments, the point that I think John Aerts is making also occurred to me. It would not be beneficial overall for someone to create applications that worked only with basic court documents valid against a "lite" subset of the CD 1.1 DTD, but not with more complicated court documents valid against the full DTD. 

 

I don't know how to deal with the risk that others may create "improper" subsets of the CD 1.1 DTD (or any other DTD for that matter) anyway, except to say, as Roger does, that they do so at their own risk (or for their own convenience).

 

At any rate, all of this convinces me that a simplified Court Document 1.1 DTD is going, going, . . . . . . . . . gone.

 

We can attempt to address possible problems of complexity, difficulty, etc. through documents, presentations, etc. as suggested.

 

Rolly Chambers

 

----- Original Message -----

From: Aerts, John F.

To: 'Winters, Roger' ; 'Bergeron, Donald L. (LNG)' ; 'Chambers, Rolly' ; 'John Messing'

Cc: 'legalxml-courtfiling@lists.oasis-open.org' ; John Ruegg (E-mail)

Sent: Tuesday, September 10, 2002 3:31 PM

Subject: RE: [legalxml-courtfiling] Salt Lake minutes

I am in complete agreement with Roger on this it is a critical task of the Technical Committee to maintain its DTDs and Schemas entire and intact. With all the work and effort that has been put into developing these "standards" why would we (TC) want to condone using only a subset of CD 1.1 DTD and then building on the subset  "Lite" version for local process.

 

John

 

Lieutenant John Aerts
Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department
Records & Identification Bureau
Consolidated Criminal History Reporting System(CCHRS) Project Manager

Phone   562.465.7876
Fax       323.415.2666
E-mail   Aerts@lasd.org

-----Original Message-----
From: Winters, Roger [mailto:Roger.Winters@METROKC.GOV]
Sent: Tuesday, September 10, 2002 8:23 AM
To: 'Bergeron, Donald L. (LNG)'; 'Chambers, Rolly'; 'John Messing'; 'legalxml-courtfiling@lists.oasis-open.org'
Subject: RE: [legalxml-courtfiling] Salt Lake minutes

I'd like to chime in with my concerns about the idea of a "DTD Lite."

 

The Court Document drafting committee has raised the question of "ease of use of" and "ease of learning" a specification as reasons for such a construct (I don't have a specific location I'm pointing to in the draft CD 1.1, but recall it's being asserted there). I admit to having not grasped the rationale for this.

 

I would not expect a non-technical, business expert to learn about the functionality, scope, and details of a specification by reading a DTD or Schema itself. Those of us advocating for standards, application developers, EFSPs, and others will need to provide written explanations, presentations, diagrams, and so forth, to promote such learning.

 

If the "Lite" version is necessary to "dumb down" the specification for use by certain application developers, I think there might be a problem with the developers. I do not understand what economy there would be in stripping some amount of ASCII text from a specification in order to "simplify" it, when that economy is contrasted with the potential costs from reconciling the kinds of errors Don has suggested might occur. Perhaps someone can explain this and convince me otherwise?

 

I feel it is a substantial and critical task of the Technical Committee to maintain its DTDs and Schemas entire and intact, to ensure they are accessible, reliable, valid, etc. If a particular application developer, court, etc., wants to build for local use a "Lite" version of the specification, they should be free to do so, but at their own risk. I do not think the Technical Committee should have "Heavy" and "Lite" versions of its products, particularly when those wanting the "Lite" version need only omit the elements they don't find relevant to their own uses. It should be up to them to keep their mini-specs valid against the official full-sized specs, which the Technical Committee would be responsible for.

 

I admit to ignorance regarding technical factors that might have motivated Todd or others to desire "Lite DTDs." I am willing to learn more about that, but need convincing on why it would be the responsibility of the Technical Committee to provide and maintain those variations. If you can't convince me on technical grounds due to my lack of such expertise, you could try persuading me by precedent - how, why, and with what effects (positive and negative) have other comparable specifications been developed and maintained in "full" and "lite" versions?

 

Regards,

 

Roger

 

Roger Winters

Electronic Court Records Manager

King County
Department of Judicial Administration

516 Third Avenue, E-609 MS: KCC-JA-0609

Seattle, Washington 98104

V: (206) 296-7838 F: (206) 296-0906

roger.winters@metrokc.gov