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Subject: Re: [dita] Conditional processing for <prop action ="include">


I am in the process of implementing DITAVAL support in my new DITA Link
Management Service library. I will review Su Laine's comments in the context
of my implementation. In my initial implementation work I found the
documentation scattered but didn't detect the ambiguities Su Laine reports,
but I may have been making assumptions that were unwarranted.

Cheers,

E.

On 1/5/10 2:21 PM, "Su-Laine Yeo" <su-laine.yeo@justsystems.com> wrote:

> Hi everyone,
> 
> There is a substantive issue crossing multiple topics in the DITA 1.2
> draft spec, so I thought I'd bring it up here. The issue is the expected
> processing behavior for the action="include" value on the DITAVAL <prop>
> element. 
> 
> Background:
> 
> There has been quite a bit of confusion in the DITA community about how
> action="include" is supposed to work. People commonly expect that if
> they have some content tagged as platform="macintosh" and other content
> tagged as platform="windows", then if they want to produce a version of
> the document for the Mac they can say <prop att = "platform" val =
> "macintosh" action= "include"/>. In the OT this does not produce desired
> results as "include" statements are ignored by the OT.
> 
> The DITA 1.1 description is here:
> http://docs.oasis-open.org/dita/v1.1/CD02/langspec/langref/ditaval-prop.
> html and it says, "Include the content in output. This is the default
> behavior unless otherwise set." It does not say whether "include"
> statements are only for the benefit of people looking at the DITAVAL
> file (which is how the spec has apparently been interpreted by the OT
> developers) or whether "include" statements are supposed to be acted
> upon by processors. Nor does it give any guidance as to how processors
> should address cases in which there are conflicting "include" and
> "exclude" statements. E.g. there is no guidance on what to do with
> content tagged with platform="macintosh windows" if you have <prop att =
> "platform" val = "macintosh" action= "include"/> and <prop att =
> "platform" val = "windows" action= "exclude"/>.
> 
> Issues in the draft DITA 1.2 spec:
> 
> The draft DITA 1.2 spec covers filtering include/exclude statements in
> the following topics:
> - <prop> element: Same description as in DITA 1.1.. Ambiguous about
> whether "include" statements are intended to be operative
> - Conditional Processing: Says, ' If all the values in an attribute have
> been set to "exclude", the attribute evaluates to "exclude" '
> which implies by omission that "include" statements are non-operative.
> - <enumerationdef> element: Defines filtering behaviour for this element
> in a way that implies that "include" statements are operative.
> - <val> element: Has an example in which it implies the "include"
> statements are operative.
> 
> Question for the TC:
> 
> I think our options are as follows:
> 1) Change the spec to say that "include" statements are non-operative,
> and remove "include" statements from all examples.
> 2) Change the spec  to say that "include" statements are operative.
> Classify the level of expectation as may, should, or must. Define
> expected behaviour in the case of conflicts between "include" and
> "exclude" statements. Classify the level of expectation for
> conflict-resolution behaviour as may, should, or must.
> 3) Change the spec to  say that the behavior of "include" is currently
> undefined, and remove "include" statements from all examples.
> 4) Status quo - make no changes.
> 5) Variations on the above?
> 
> My first choice is #3. Option #2 does not seem feasible for DITA 1.2.
> Thoughts?
> 
> Cheers,
> Su-Laine
> 
> 
> Su-Laine Yeo
> Solutions Consultant
> JustSystems Canada, Inc.
> Office: 778-327-6356
> syeo@justsystems.com
> www.justsystems.com <http://www.xmetal.com>
> XMetaL Community Forums: http://forums.xmetal.com/
> 
> 
> 

-- 
Eliot Kimber
Senior Solutions Architect
"Bringing Strategy, Content, and Technology Together"
Main: 610.631.6770
www.reallysi.com
www.rsuitecms.com



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