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Subject: Proposed Feature #22
Attached is the description for proposed 2.0 feature #22 (time-in-range). The function is being proposed as an errata item since it represents functionality that the 1.0 specification was supposed to contain, but does not. seth
22: time-in-range function Provide a function for comparing that a time of day is between two other times of day. MOTIVATING USE-CASE AND REQUIREMENT The XACML 1.0 specification includes a standard representation of time in the http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#time datatype, and also includes functions for operating on time values. Some of these functions are comparators. One of the motivating uses for these comparison functions was to be able to determine whether some time falls between two other times (eg, is the access time between 09:00:00 and 17:00:00). This is a very common access pattern that is needed by many. Unfortunately, due to the way that time is represented, the comparison functions don't actually provide this functionality with any guarantees. This was discussed in a thread starting with http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/xacml/200307/msg00044.html Therefore, there is no standard way to see if a given time falls in a given range of time. The proposed function provides that functionality. Because this is a widely needed feature, it's important to have a standard way to support this range comparison. This feature is being proposed as an errata, since it fixes a problem with the specification (namely, there is supposed to be support for checking if a time is in a range, but the current specification is in error since it doesn't actually support this use case). SUMMARY OF OPEN ISSUES There is no open issue for this feature, though this change is related to open issues associated with the http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#time datatype and its associated functions. These were first raised in http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/xacml/200307/msg00044.html These issues were discussed on the list, and there was tentative agreement on the given proposal. The issue is currently in front of the XMLSchema group. PROPOSED SOLUTION A proposal was already made in http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/xacml/200307/msg00044.html for a function named time-in-range that takes 3 parameters (all of type http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#time), and returns true iff the first parameter falls between the second and the third parameters. In early discussions on the TC list, this solution seems to be acceptable. DETAILED SOLUTION This requires no schema changes. Details to follow when a solution has been agreed upon.
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