Latest/This Version URI for Schema/WSDL files

["Patil, Sanjay" <sanjay.patil@sap.com>]

Title: Latest/This Version URI for Schema/WSDL files

This is regarding naming of the schema files and the URI for storing the schema files in the OASIS doc repository.

The OpenCSA Steering Committee's recommendation for Filename and URL Consistency [1] suggests the following format for schema file name: sca-[productName]-[versionNum]-[docType]-[yyyymm].[ext], an example of which would look like: sca-assembly-1.1-schema-200712.xsd. Note that this recommendation does not include any suggestions for URI for the schema files in the OASIS doc repository.

The SCA BPEL TC discussed this topic on the 3/19/08 conf-call [2] and here are my notes from that discussion:

- The contents of schema files typically do not change as frequently as the associated specification files. In particular, the schema files may remain unchanged while the document level of the associated specification is moved up (CDxx -->CSxx --> OSxx). Therefore, 'This Version URI' for schema files does not have to include bits related to the document-level.

- 'This Version URI' for schema files needs to be changed whenever the content of that schema file receives an update in order to ensure that new versions do not overwrite the previous versions, and all the versions remain accessible. A solution here would be for 'This Version URI' for schema files to include the month-year of when updates were applied to their content of the schema files.

- Since the recommended schema file name already includes the month-year info from the corresponding namespace URI, it would be awkward to add another month-year info to the schema file name corresponding to when updates were applied to its contents.

- 'Latest Version URI' can include only the month-year of the corresponding namespace URI, and need not include the month-year corresponding to when updates were applied to the content of the schema files.

- The values for 'This Version URI' and 'Latest Version URI' for schema files are independent of the URI value of the namespace to which the definitions in the schema file contribute to.

The SCA BPEL TC adopted the following resolutions:
This Version URI:
Format: http://docs.oasis-open.org/opencsa/sca-bpel/[yyyy-of-namespace-URI]/[mm-of-namespace-URI]/sca-bpel-1.1-schema-[yyyymm-of-content-update].xsd

Example: http://docs.oasis-open.org/opencsa/sca-bpel/2007/12/sca-bpel-1.1-schema-200803.xsd

Latest Version URI:
Format: http://docs.oasis-open.org/opencsa/sca-bpel/[yyyy-of-namespace-URI]/[mm-of-namespace-URI]/sca-bpel-1.1-schema.xsd

Example: http://docs.oasis-open.org/opencsa/sca-bpel/2007/12/sca-bpel-1.1-schema.xsd

Note that the above discussion would also be relevant in regards to the other artifacts associated with the specifications such as WSDL files, etc.

Since this topic is concerning the various OpenCSA TCs, I was given an action item to bring this issue to the attention of the OpenCSA Liaison Subcommittee and suggest for consideration of the resolution adopted by the SCA BPEL TC as a recommendation for the rest of the OpenCSA TCs.

-- Sanjay
On Behalf of SCA BPEL TC

[1] http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/sca-bpel/200710/msg00063.html
[2] http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/sca-bpel/200803/msg00037.html