[Date Prev] | [Thread Prev] | [Thread Next] | [Date Next] -- [Date Index] | [Thread Index] | [List Home]
Subject: RE: [docstandards-interop-discuss] proposed TC name
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: RE: [docstandards-interop-discuss] proposed TC name
From: "Earley, Jim" <Jim.Earley@flatironssolutions.com>
Date: Tue, April 24, 2007 12:52 pm
To: "David RR Webber (XML)" <david@drrw.info>
Cc: "Dave Pawson" <dave.pawson@gmail.com>,
<docstandards-interop-discuss@lists.oasis-open.org>, "Peter F Brown"
<peter@pensive.eu>David, Perhaps I unintentionally muddied the water. In fact, we're very cognizant that this could easily devolve into ocean boiling. Instead, by focusing specifically and _only_ on the interop format as the mission of this TC, we're not trying to explicitly tackle interoperability between any specific XML grammars. The primary deliverable from this TC is the specification that describes the interop format, not any particular transformation scenario to or from any particular standard. With that said, standards like DocBook, DITA, and ODF are interested in participating in the development of an interoperability format that would enable these standards to share content. Other similar narrative grammars like TEI, OOXML, BNML, or LegalXML could then leverage the work of this TC to "plug and play". Another possible way of thinking about this, from an Object Oriented Programming metaphor: think of the Interop Format as the "interface" that must be implemented to enable an XML grammar to interoperate with other grammars. The format is merely an agreed-upon contract that describes how specific semantics from a particular XML grammar will be addressed in the interop. Consequently, this same contract enables other XML grammars to process information from a common format in a way that best fits its particular semantics. One of the examples I've used in the past: DocBook image markup: <mediaobject> <imageobject> <imagedata url="my-graphic.png"/> </imageobject> </mediaobject> DITA: <image href="my-graphic.png"/> Interop markup (proposed as XHTML): <img src="my-graphic.png"/> With the Interop markup, the intent is that ~any~ grammar wanting to plug and play will agree that the <img> tag is an image. When DocBook is written to the interop, it will transform the <mediaobject> markup to <img>; conversely, when content in the interop is read into DocBook, the <img> tag will be transformed to the appropriate <mediaobject> markup required. The same is true for DITA. Jim ================ Jim Earley XML Developer/Consultant Flatirons Solutions 4747 Table Mesa Drive Boulder, CO 80301 Voice: 303.542.2156 Fax: 303.544.0522 Cell: 303.898.7193 Yahoo.IM: jmearley MSN.IM: jearley22@hotmail.com jim.earley@flatironssolutions.com -----Original Message----- From: David RR Webber (XML) [mailto:david@drrw.info] Sent: Tuesday, April 24, 2007 9:35 AM To: Earley, Jim Cc: Dave Pawson; docstandards-interop-discuss@lists.oasis-open.org; Peter F Brown Subject: RE: [docstandards-interop-discuss] proposed TC name Jim, And I would caution that your example is ocean-boiling in the making. The simpler approach beckons - of specifying a format for technical documents in XML - that avoids and side steps all the WSIYIG baggage - and allows each tool maker to implement a simple template / macro - that outputs to that format using an XSD master that defines the "XTX" structure. Most all of them already have that capability. Therefore I would re-draw your example as: - User A writes content with macro in DocBook tool - stores as XTX format - User B writes content with macro in DITA tool - stores as DITA+XTX format - User C writes content with macro in ODF tool - stores as XTX format - User D writes content with macro in OOXML tool - stores as XTX format XTX can then be rendered using xslt or imported back into each tool as needed. XTX can be processed by downstream XML systems. DW "The way to be is to do" - Confucius (551-472 B.C.) -------- Original Message -------- Subject: RE: [docstandards-interop-discuss] proposed TC name From: "Earley, Jim" <Jim.Earley@flatironssolutions.com> Date: Tue, April 24, 2007 10:42 am To: "David RR Webber (XML)" <david@drrw.info>, "Peter F Brown" <peter@pensive.eu> Cc: "Dave Pawson" <dave.pawson@gmail.com>, <docstandards-interop-discuss@lists.oasis-open.org> All, The problem space that we've identified here is focused around the following type of user story: - User A writes content with DocBook - User B writes content with DITA - User C writes content with ODF - User D writes content with OOXML User A needs to leverage content from Users B, C, and D; User D must share content from User A and B. Since each of these "Narrative" XML "Documentation Standards" is semantically different, the idea is to provide a common interchange markup that enables each of these standards to write to and subsequently read from. Think "hub and spoke": the hub is the common interchage markup, each spoke is a particular structured markup standard (and version), like DocBook 4.4, DITA 1.0, or ODF 1.0 The basic premise is to mitigate the number of transformation scenarios that would otherwise be required to support interchange between these standards. Additionally: * Since each standard will continue to evolve, using a common interchange format reduces the number of transformation permutations required to enable interchange with other standards * Other narrative XML grammars, like TEI, DocBook variants, or DITA specializations could take advantage of an interchange format to enable content sharing with other XML grammars. I have written about this topic with several posts to my blog: http://jims-thoughtspot.blogspot.com/search/label/interoperability I hope this helps clarify the direction of this proposed TC. Cheers, Jim ================ Jim Earley XML Developer/Consultant Flatirons Solutions 4747 Table Mesa Drive Boulder, CO 80301 Voice: 303.542.2156 Fax: 303.544.0522 Cell: 303.898.7193 Yahoo.IM: jmearley MSN.IM: jearley22@hotmail.com jim.earley@flatironssolutions.com -----Original Message----- From: David RR Webber (XML) [mailto:david@drrw.info] Sent: Tuesday, April 24, 2007 7:47 AM To: Peter F Brown Cc: Dave Pawson; docstandards-interop-discuss@lists.oasis-open.org Subject: RE: [docstandards-interop-discuss] proposed TC name Peter, We had this big discussion two weeks ago. The current scope text is misleading. It is my understanding that the whole idea is to NOT get immersed in the OOXML / ODF / PDF quagmire - but instead to provide a simple XML format for documentation purposes - envisioned as a blend of DITA + xhtml + extensions and an XSD. Notice that content authoring tools already support use of XSD templates to instruct the creation of conforming documents - including MS Word, Corel, ODF, and then specialized editors such as XMetal. So published templates can then be used in a variety of tools to produce the XML content instances themselves. This would allow the EU to publish templates for documents that would work in any any desktop tool supporting it. In essence this sidesteps the current generation of syntaxes - which are focused much on WYSIWYG content production - rather than content semantic and formatting alignment. Given all that - a simple TC name should elucidate the focus here - and not lead people into thinking the problem being solved is some bigger uber-solution. Thanks, DW "The way to be is to do" - Confucius (551-472 B.C.) -------- Original Message -------- Subject: RE: [docstandards-interop-discuss] proposed TC name From: "Peter F Brown" <peter@pensive.eu> Date: Tue, April 24, 2007 9:39 am To: "Dave Pawson" <dave.pawson@gmail.com>, <docstandards-interop-discuss@lists.oasis-open.org> In a European context, "documentation" would nearly always equate to "technical documentation" and be understood as things like DocBook and not, say, legislative texts, business documents, etc. But: - when does a legislative document get covered by LegalXML? - when does a business document get covered by UBL? We can easily get lost: it should be more specific than any "XML document" but less specific than particular "XML application" documents. I understood the scope to be about interoperability between "generic" documents generated by "all-purpose" word-processing software, be that in ODF, DocBook, etc - but that begs the more fundamental question: why isn't the biggest document production platform included, that generates OOXML? The scope of the proposed TC needs to be serious in addressing this dimension, or it will be a fool's errand. Has anyone compared the scope with the new activity in the European Commission on "Open Document Exchange Formats" (!= ODF)? Could this be a collaborative effort? Is their title more useful? I think the proposed TC needs to be MUCH clearer about its scope before it'll get our vote. Peter ------------- Peter F Brown Founder, Pensive.eu Co-Editor, OASIS SOA Reference Model Lecturer at XML Summer School --- Personal: +43 676 610 0250 http://public.xdi.org/=Peter.Brown www.XMLbyStealth.net <http://www.xmlbystealth.net/> <http://www.xmlbystealth.net/> www.xmlsummerschool.com <http://www.xmlsummerschool.com/> <http://www.xmlsummerschool.com/> -----Original Message----- From: Dave Pawson [mailto:dave.pawson@gmail.com] Sent: 23 April 2007 14:32 To: docstandards-interop-discuss@lists.oasis-open.org Subject: Re: [docstandards-interop-discuss] proposed TC name On 23/04/07, David RR Webber (XML) <david@drrw.info> wrote: > > I actually quite like Eduardo's: > > Documentation Standards Interoperability TC. > > "Documentation" is vague enough IMHO - and people will likewise need to read the charter for explicit clarifications I like the terseness and yes, the generality. All it means is we need clarification early on in the web pages / actual standard to scope the work, which is no bad thing IMHO. > I'm not sure I'd go into machine v human readable - since that distinction is rapidly being eroded by smart machine agents. Yes, I find that (potentially) too constraining. Most will stay one side of their own boundaries, but that doesn't mean that the other side is out of scope? regards -- Dave Pawson XSLT XSL-FO FAQ. http://www.dpawson.co.uk <http://www.dpawson.co.uk/> <http://www.dpawson.co.uk/> --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: docstandards-interop-discuss-unsubscribe@lists.oasis-open.org For additional commands, e-mail: docstandards-interop-discuss-help@lists.oasis-open.org No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.463 / Virus Database: 269.5.7/771 - Release Date: 21/04/2007 11:56 No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.463 / Virus Database: 269.5.10/774 - Release Date: 23/04/2007 17:26 --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: docstandards-interop-discuss-unsubscribe@lists.oasis-open.org For additional commands, e-mail: docstandards-interop-discuss-help@lists.oasis-open.org
[Date Prev] | [Thread Prev] | [Thread Next] | [Date Next] -- [Date Index] | [Thread Index] | [List Home]