Re: [tag] Referencing external test assertions

[Stephen Green <stephen.green@documentengineeringservices.com>]

Another way

<testAssertionRef>
  <resource url="..." filename=".." fileID="...">
    <taSetId value="..">
      <taSetId value="..">
        <taId>..</taId>
      </taSetId>
    </taSetId>
  </document>
</testAssertionRef>

This has the advantage of us not needing any BNF, just schema.

Metadata could included as further attributes (there are various
places to add these - 'resource' or 'testAssertionRef' or 'taSetId'
or 'taId')

Questions: What happens if the TAs are in a database?
Does that mean the database has to be REST-enabled
or equivalent? What if it is a paper document? etc
Maybe this can be handled with further attributes on 'resource':

<testAssertionRef>
  <resource url="..." filename=".." fileID="..." sql="..." ref="..." date="...">
    <taSetId value="..">
      <taSetId value="..">
        <taId>..</taId>
      </taSetId>
    </taSetId>
  </document>
</testAssertionRef>

Would this mechanism handle TAs in formats other
than TAML? e.g javadocs? HTML? WS-I's XML? macros?
Schematron? UML/CDL? XML Schema even? ANSI prose?
Predict? Docbook? DITA? PDF? ODF? etc As long as
each TA has a unique ID and the document as a whole
can be uniquely identified then I guess so. Not sure TAs
in source code, etc have identifiers though - line numbers
may be needed. How would we represent a line number?
As an attribute on 'taId' perhaps so perhaps more appropriate
is:

...
      <taSetId value="..">
        <taId value=".." lineNumber="..">
      </taSetId>
...


---
Stephen D Green




2009/9/18 Stephen Green <stephengreenubl@gmail.com>:
> Plus we could give our notation a language code (like
> we could give XPath 2.0 the 'xpath2' code) so it can
> be added to the testAssertionRef's @lg attribute
>
> e.g. 'ta'
> <testAssertionRef
> lg='ta'>("http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/download.php/34247/ubl-ta-draft-0-61.xml";)."Test
>  Assertions for Universal Business Language v2 Invoice Calculation
>  Model".invoice-calculation-model-001.INVTAX001</testAssertionRef>
>
> this would distinguish it from any XPath equivalent
>
> <testAssertionRef
> lg="xpath20">doc("http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/download.php/34247/ubl-ta-draft-0-61.xml";)//*[local-name(.)='testAssertionSet']/@id='invoice-calculation-model-001'/*[local-name(.)='testAssertion']/@id='INVTAX001'</testAssertionRef>
>
> or (aside from namespace issues)
>
> <testAssertionRef
> lg="xpath20">doc("http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/download.php/34247/ubl-ta-draft-0-61.xml";)//testAssertionSet/@id='invoice-calculation-model-001'/testAssertion/@id='INVTAX001'</testAssertionRef>
>
> or (with the namespace prefixed and resolved somehow)
>
> <testAssertionRef
> lg="xpath20">doc("http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/download.php/34247/ubl-ta-draft-0-61.xml";)//tag:testAssertionSet/@id='invoice-calculation-model-001'/tag:testAssertion/@id='INVTAX001'</testAssertionRef>
>
>
> (though I'm not even sure the XPath one is valid in place of
> an identifier since it resolves to a node rather than a location/ID
> - something an XPath profile would perhaps need to sort out
> if it allowed this expression for the TA ref)
>
>
> ---
> Stephen D Green
>
>
>
>
> 2009/9/18 Stephen Green <stephengreenubl@gmail.com>:
>> Afterthought: Instead of escaping '.' and '$' in any filenames,
>> filepaths or URLs
>> (I'm not sure '$' is allowed anyway so it might just be '.' we need to consider)
>> they could be wrapped in quotes (as with spaces, perhaps) so that favours the
>> <ref name='ref1'>url | filename | filepath + filename</ref> approach which does
>> not need to use its own quotes too.
>>
>> But given that there is maybe a third design - just allow the point notation to
>> include the filepath/url as the first part (before the first point)
>> wrapped, say,
>> in its own quotes
>>
>> <testAssertionRef>"http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/download.php/34247/ubl-ta-%20draft-0-61.xml"."Test
>> Assertions for Universal Business Language v2 Invoice Calculation
>> Model".invoice-calculation-model-001.INVTAX001</testAssertionRef>
>>
>> This avoids the need for any extra elements in the TA markup. It has
>> disadvantages
>> of course, like verbosity and possible duplication. Or define a
>> separate way to wrap
>> the first filename/url part
>>
>> e.g.
>> <testAssertionRef>("http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/download.php/34247/ubl-ta-%20draft-0-61.xml";)."Test
>> Assertions for Universal Business Language v2 Invoice Calculation
>> Model".invoice-calculation-model-001.INVTAX001</testAssertionRef>
>>
>> Best regards
>>
>> ---
>> Stephen D Green
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> 2009/9/18 Stephen Green <stephengreenubl@gmail.com>:
>>> I guess one way is with a variable
>>>
>>> <var name="doc1"
>>> lg="xpath20">doc("http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/download.php/34247/ubl-ta-%20draft-0-61.xml";)</var>
>>> ...
>>> <testAssertionRef>$doc1."Test Assertions for Universal Business
>>> Language v2 Invoice Calculation
>>> Model".invoice-calculation-model-001.INVTAX001</testAssertionRef>
>>>
>>> but what about the testAssertionRef here - it has to combine two
>>> syntaxes - XPath for the variable with our own point notation for
>>> the IDs.
>>>
>>> A pure XPath way would be to not use the point notation but some
>>> XPath equivalent:
>>>
>>> something like
>>>
>>> <testAssertionRef
>>> lg="xpath20">$doc1//*[local-name(.)='testAssertionSet']/@id='invoice-calculation-model-001'/*[local-name(.)='testAssertion']/@id='INVTAX001'</testAssertionRef>
>>>
>>> or even, without the variable
>>>
>>> <testAssertionRef
>>> lg="xpath20">doc("http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/download.php/34247/ubl-ta-%20draft-0-61.xml";)//*[local-name(.)='testAssertionSet']/@id='invoice-calculation-model-001'/*[local-name(.)='testAssertion']/@id='INVTAX001'</testAssertionRef>
>>>
>>> but it's no where near as neat as the point-separated ref notation.
>>>
>>> If we include the point notation built in to the markup (not everyone
>>> is familiar with XPath nor should have to be), like packages notation
>>> in Java, then maybe we need a special reference element (a bit like
>>> a special variable element):
>>>
>>> <ref url='http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/download.php/34247/ubl-ta-%20draft-0-61.xml'
>>> name='ref1'/>
>>>
>>> or
>>>
>>> <ref name='ref1'>http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/download.php/34247/ubl-ta-%20draft-0-61.xml</ref>
>>>
>>> (the latter assuming more, eg that the ref is navigable using usual methods like
>>> trying as a filepath/filename then trying as a url or that a
>>> filepath/filename will
>>> always be presented as a file:/// url which leaves less scope for
>>> relative paths)
>>>
>>> Then the TA ref is something like:
>>>
>>> <testAssertionRef>$ref1."Test Assertions for Universal Business
>>> Language v2 Invoice Calculation
>>> Model".invoice-calculation-model-001.INVTAX001</testAssertionRef>
>>>
>>> and we might want to have a dot dot notation (like the '//' in XPath) to
>>> show a more indefinite child relationship (any child or granchild) to
>>> avoid something like that cumbersome first ID in my example
>>>
>>> <testAssertionRef>$ref1..invoice-calculation-model-001.INVTAX001</testAssertionRef>
>>>
>>> There are weaknesses
>>>
>>> 1. having to use BNF or the like to define this notation formally
>>> 2. having to have reservced characters e.g. '$' and '.' (and '..') which
>>>    realistically could appear in the IDs
>>>
>>> 2. could be gotten around specifying an escape character like '\'
>>>
>>> 1. may just be essential extra work in the spec - anyone any good at BNF? :-)
>>>
>>>
>>> XPath binding profile tools would just need to support both
>>> methods if the latter point notation is part of the TAML spec,
>>> I guess. That presumably applies to any profile and may be
>>> quite an overhead. Quite powerful to have it though.
>>>
>>> ---
>>> Stephen D Green
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> 2009/9/18 Kevin Looney <Kevin.T.Looney@sun.com>:
>>>> Hi Stephen,
>>>>
>>>>   This is a good question to bring up.
>>>>
>>>>    I'm not aware of any rules here, but it seems like a 'convention' (or
>>>> guideline) would go a long way for TA organization or Tool processing.  This
>>>> issue seems fairly similar to TA naming, which we also gave
>>>> guidelines/conventions - so I'm guessing we should treat this similarly.
>>>>
>>>> The example you gave seems logical (concentric owning sets, separated by
>>>> dots). Perhaps one of the identifiers (probably the outermost one) needs to
>>>> be a symbolic representation of the Spec Name / version / revision / date.
>>>>  Then again, we may wish to refer to TAs from specs, where the TAs live over
>>>> multiple versions (so specifying version / revision / date is not
>>>> important).
>>>>
>>>> Regarding 'import',  this may be important for a schema.  For the spec
>>>> itself, it seems like a well formed specification should describe (in some
>>>> sort of references section) where it refers to behavior / conformance from
>>>> another spec.  Likewise, an analysis should probably describe some sort of
>>>> reference too.
>>>>
>>>> Just some thoughts off the top of my head.
>>>> Kevin L
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Regarding
>>>> Stephen Green wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> Re: Referencing external test assertions
>>>>>
>>>>> Questions:
>>>>>
>>>>> Given that I have a set of TAs in an upper level TA Set
>>>>> in an instance file/document, how would I apply a set
>>>>> of prerequisites to these TAs as a whole or individually
>>>>> using the Test Assertion Markup Language? Is there
>>>>> any special construct or best practice I would need to
>>>>> clarify unambiguously that the TAs (referenced by their
>>>>> IDs and the TA Set IDs e.g. 'TASet1.TASet2.ta0001')
>>>>> are to be found in a certain file? Do we need some kind
>>>>> of construct in the referring instance like an 'include' or
>>>>> 'import' statement/element? How is this done in other
>>>>> TA methodologies/languages? Would it be something
>>>>> new/untested for TAML if we added it? Could tools handle
>>>>> such a construct properly? What issues might there be?
>>>>>
>>>>> Best regards
>>>>> ---
>>>>> Stephen D Green
>>>>>
>>>>> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
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>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>
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