RE: [legalxml-econtracts] Pruning XHTML2 for eContracts - draft 2

["John McClure" <jmcclure@hypergrove.com>]

Hello and welcome Mary,

XHTML is not intended to be used as the carrier of meta-information about the
document. Meta-information is better carried in a different, companion document
that is linked to the presentation document in a manner standardized by XHTML
2.0 (likely as a link in the header, or via XForms).

I do agree with you about the "behind-the-scene" nature of schemas, but there is
equally the strong desire to accommodate direct entry of contract markup -- that
is, markup for a presentation document. It is quite useful to adopt XHTML 2.0
for this very purpose, as markup for presentation material. XHTML 2.0 is not
useful in the context of a metadata document about the contract however.

Certainly, with application of an XSL-T, a presentation document can be
generated from the metadata document. However, direct entry of markup for a
metadata document would involve exactly what many, including yourself, do not
wish to see -- a dialect that is far greater than the perceived, immediate,
needs of a contract author. By "pruning" XHTML 2.0, we can therefore deliver a
"nimble" schema specific to the everyday task of creating the text content of a
contract; we are therefore freed to develop a functionally-rich schema for the
metadata ABOUT the contract.

A lossless exchange of contract metadata is vital to a contract's negotiation,
administration, and mediation. But this is a separate document == there is no
intent whatsoever to "load up" XHTML elements in a presentation document with
metadata attributes or metadata child elements and, hence, the need for a
separate metadata document exists. There IS intent to establish a schema for a
metadata document ABOUT the contract presentation document however... and there
IS intent to establish a schema for a "clause library" that is not XHTML, but
which may certainly include XHTML for markup of the text content of the clause
and its sub-sections that is to be used when the library clause is selected to
be cloned into an instance contract document.

Hope that helps,
John