RE: [xliff] Re: XLIFF 1.1 Specification Working Draft 14 - RC5

[David Pooley <DPooley@sdlintl.com>]

I'm not comfortable with this for the reasons outlined below.

 

As I understand it, <bx/> is a shortened way of writing <bpt></bpt> and <ex/> is a shortened way of writing <ept></ept>. Quite why we need these extra tags (saving six characters per occurrence) is a little bit beyond me to start with. However, <bpt> and <ept> are taken from the TMX format where there is an attribute, "i" which links them together. This is a required attribute in these tags.

 

In the specification, <bx> and <ex> as described as "begin paired placeholder" and "end paired placeholder" respectively. To me, this means that each <bx/> must have a corresponding <ex> and vice-versa. If this is the case then there must be a mandatory attribute that links them together. However, under John's proposal, we are suggesting that the <bx/> and <ex/> tags should be linked via a non-mandatory attribute. We're are also suggesting linking them together using an attribute which has a vague description and could be used for a variety of purposes (including using it as a lookup device in the skeleton file), some of which are references outside of the <trans-unit>.

 

Either the rid becomes mandatory for <bx/>, <ex/>, <bpt> and <ept> (and its wording is changed to reflect its new status) or we agree to use the id attribute. With John's example, it's still possible to have the rid as optional and use it to reference in to the skeleton:

 

Original

{This is translatable text which is {/weight=+w1}bold, {/weight=+w3} italic and bold{/weight=-w1}, and italic.{/weight=-w3}} 

Skeleton
{#TU id=18#
  #CODE rid=19#{/weight=-w1}
  #CODE rid=20#{/weight=+w3}
  #CODE rid=21#{/weight=-w1}
  #CODE rid=22#{//weight=-w3}
}

XLIFF

<trans-unit id="18">
  <source>This is translatable text which is <bx id="1" rid="19"/>bold, <bx id="2" rid="20"/>italic and bold<ex id="1" rid="21"/>, and italic<ex id="2" rid="22"/>.</source>
</trans-unit>

 

David Pooley

Software Architect

SDL International

 

-----Original Message-----
From: Mark Levins [mailto:mark_levins@ie.ibm.com]
Sent: 08 May 2003 10:21
To: JREID@novell.com
Cc: xliff@lists.oasis-open.org
Subject: RE: [xliff] Re: XLIFF 1.1 Specification Working Draft 14 - RC5

Hi John, 

I fully agree with your mail, it describes 
the usage we originally came up with, which in essence means that 'id' 
attributes are for the general purpose of linking information to a skeletal data 
while 'rid' attributes are used to refer related information within an XLIFF 
document. 

Regards,

Mark Levins

IBM Software Group, Dublin Software Laboratory, Airways Industrial Estate, Cloghran, Dublin 17, Ireland.

Phone: +353 1 704 6676 IBM Tie Line 166676

"John Reid" <JREID@novell.com>

07/05/2003 23:36

To	<ddomeny@ektron.com>, "<", <ysavourel@translate.com>
cc
Subject	RE: [xliff] Re: XLIFF 1.1 Specification Working Draft 14 - RC5

Hi Doug, Yves, et al, 
  
Doug Domeny wrote: 
>Replace "These paired 
elements are related via their rid attributes" (occurs
>5 times) 
with: 
> 
>These paired 
elements are matched by setting their id attributes to the same
>value. 
For example, <bx id="34"/> ... <ex id="34"/> 
I think we are imposing a method on the XLIFF filters and a format on the 
skeletons with this change. Suppose we have a file format with the following 
text: 
  
{This is 
translatable text which is {/weight=+w1}bold, {/weight=+w3} italic and 
bold{/weight=-w1}, and italic.{/weight=-w3}} 
  
Here the codes are allowed to overlap. 
I've used bold and italic for simplicity but this could be complicated with more 
complex codes. The filter assigns each code a separate id because without a 
lookup table of some sort the filter doesn't know that /weight=+w1 means 'bold'. 
It does recognize that weight=+w1 and weight=-w1 are paired. Also, the developer 
of the filter did not want to regenerate codes that could as easily be stored. 
Thus, the skeleton for this text may look as follows: 
  
{#TU id=18# 
  
#CODE id=19#{/weight=-w1} 
  #CODE 
id=20#{/weight=+w3} 
  #CODE 
id=21#{/weight=-w1} 
  #CODE 
id=22#{//weight=-w3} 
} 
  
The <trans-unit> appears as 
follows: 
  
<trans-unit 
id = "18"> 
  <source>This is translatable 
text which is <bx id="19" rid="1"/>bold, <bx id="20" rid="2"/>italic 
and bold<ex id="21" rid="1"/>, and italic<ex id="22" 
rid="2"/>. 
  </source> 
</trans-unit> 
  
Thus, the id attribute relates the codes in the skeleton to the inline 
elements in the XLIFF. The rid attribute relates the paired codes to each 
other. 
  
If the id must 
match between the the paired codes, the skeleton wouldn't store the end codes 
and the postprocessor must generate those. 
  
This is why I think that the paired codes, 
<bx/>+<ex/> and <bpt>+<ept>, should be related via the 
rid attribute. This gives the greatest freedom to the filter writers. 
  
--john 


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