Re: [office] ODF 1.2 Single-Level Conformance and Law of UnintendedConsequences

[Patrick Durusau <patrick@durusau.net>]

Rob,

robert_weir@us.ibm.com wrote:

<snip>
>> My conservatism around preference for the dual levels has to do with
>> not wanting to eliminate something valuable by mistake. 
>>
>>     
>
> If it was valuable, then I'd expect to see some implementation, any 
> implementation, use the feature in the 4 years since ODF 1.0 was approved. 
>  But it hasn't happened.  Of course, is someone finds it to be valuable, 
> they can still extend their documents.  It simply won't be conformant. The 
> standard can't tell anyone what they can and cannot do.  That's not our 
> role.  What we do is define conformance as a basis for interoperability. 
> Arbitrary extensions are outside of any basis for interoperability, so I'd 
> argue they should be outside of conformance.
>
>   
Let me say back what I am hearing to see if it matches what you and 
other single level conformance folks are saying:

Conformance of ODF documents:

That an ODF document is "conforming" if and only if it meets the 
requirements and definitions more fully set forth in ODF 1.2.

Conformance of ODF applications:

That an ODF application is "conforming" if and only if it honors the 
requirements and definitions more fully set forth in ODF 1.2. That is to 
say an application can choose to do more than ODF 1.2, it could have 
photo processing capabilities for example, but it could not then claim 
to be ODF 1.2 conformant. Yes?

I agree with the first one. That is in part driven by my own view of the 
importance of file formats as part of the interoperability equation (a 
necessary but not sufficient part).

I do puzzle and hesitate over the second one. If I create an application 
that does everything required of it by ODF 1.2 and at the same time 
allows a user photo editing capabilities for images that are then stored 
in a conforming ODF 1.2 document. That is the resulting file is fully 
ODF 1.2 conformant. So, in what way is my application not conforming to 
ODF 1.2?

Or to put it another way, doesn't the greater include the lesser?

Or is there some other issue that I am overlooking?

Hope you are having a great day!

Patrick

-- 
Patrick Durusau
patrick@durusau.net
Chair, V1 - US TAG to JTC 1/SC 34
Convener, JTC 1/SC 34/WG 3 (Topic Maps)
Editor, OpenDocument Format TC (OASIS), Project Editor ISO/IEC 26300
Co-Editor, ISO/IEC 13250-1, 13250-5 (Topic Maps)