URI, SOI (off topic)

[Terry Allen <tallen@sonic.net>]

changing the subject line for variety ...

Norm wrote:
| / Terry Allen <tallen@sonic.net> was heard to say:
| | They are, in order:
| | 
| | http://www.oasis-open.org/docbook/xml/4.1.2/
| | http://www.oasis-open.org/docbook/xml/4.1.2/
| | http://www.oasis-open.org/docbook/schema/4.1.2/
| 
| Oh, barf, I meant them all to be the same.

I don't think it matters; your argument is the same either way.
...
| | And yes, you could have used different URLs for the DTD and the
| | style sheet.  I think that that's the only way in which you'll ever 
| | be able to count on that instance being processed the same way
| | by various tools.
| 
| Tools that understand xmlcat will work just fine with
| 
| <system id="http://www.oasis-open.org/docbook/xml/4.1.2/" soi="docbook.dtd"/>
| <stylesheet id="http://www.oasis-open.org/docbook/xml/4.1.2/" soi="docbook.css"/>
| <schemaloc id="http://www.oasis-open.org/docbook/xml/4.1.2/" soi="docbook.xsd"/>

I was commenting on the instance, not the catalogue.  The instance
won't work with existing tools.

In the construction above, you've just broken a locator into two
parts, you haven't properly typologized the entities.  You're
still relying on some system (either the yet-to-be-written tools
that understand xmlcat or the server they talk to) to recognize
.css and ensure that the correct flavor of style sheet is obtained.
Paul pointed out that you don't want to have to rely on filename suffix
conventions, so you're really going to have to use a full URL or
we're going to have to make functional classes for various kinds
of style sheets.

So I don't see the point of breaking up the locator *in this example*,
and so the typology of XML functions doesn't seem to be doing any
particular good.

| | And do you have software that actually will fetch the DTD or the style
| | sheet from the same directory depending on the XML function of its
| | identifier?  Maybe I'm missing something, but this seems a contrived
| | example that doesn't solve any real problem. 
| 
| No, I don't, but if I had a catalog that let me get the right answer,
| I might.

But you don't really need it, right?  And what advantage would it
provide? 

| Terry, are you really suggesting that this boils down to
| 
|   <uri target="first uri" destination="second uri"/>

I don't see why it isn't sufficient, but I may be missing
something.  It has the advantage of being real simple and
perfectly scaleable to new types of XML function.

| and that's all we should provide?

Well, no, we agreed to do something else.  But Paul's good
points about the XML function/context typology in the socat
have caused me to wonder whether it's needed.  Strictly,
this is all off topic and out of scope.

| I think that's just awful. It means I must use unique "first uri"
| across all applications all the time forever or I'm going to get
| hosed.

Um, yeah, you want to call things by their exact names, don't
you?  (Or point at them by their exact locations, or abuse names
as locators or locators as names ....)

You can always make a URL or URN for "the latest version
of foo", though I don't know that it would be real useful for
XML.

regards, Terry