Known Errors in the SMIL 1.0 Specification

Last update: $Date: 2004/06/15 15:53:42 $ by $Author hoschka $

Philipp Hoschka, W3C (ph@w3.org)


Errors or problems in the SMIL 1.0 specification not already listed here should be reported to smil-editors@w3.org.

Please also check the archive of the smil-editors list whether additional problems have been reported that have not yet been incorporated into this document. Note that problem reports to this list are not official errors as long as they don´t show up on the "known errors" page.

Table of Contents

• Errors in the Specification Proper
• Non-Errors

Errors in the Specification Proper

This section lists known errors or problems in the SMIL specification itself.

• Section 3.3.1: in the description of the "fit" attribute and its "meet" value, the text "empty space at the left or bottom is filled" should read "empty space at the right or bottom is filled"
  
  Error Report:
  

  Date: Wed, 06 May 1998 12:06:38 -0500
  To: ph@w3.org
  From: Tom Magliery <mag@ncsa.uiuc.edu>
  Subject: smil spec typos
  
  ...
  
  1.  in section 3.3.1, about <region fit="meet">, the text "empty
  space at the left or bottom is filled" should read "empty space at
  the right or bottom is filled"
  ....
      

• Section 3.3.1: At the end of the description of the "fit attribute, the text 'The default value of "fill" is "hidden"' should read 'The default value of "fit" is "hidden"'.
  
  Error Report:

  From: Susanna Lowrey <slowrey@ixl.com>
  ...
  To: ph@w3.org
  Subject: possible error found in section 3.3.1 of SMIL 1.0 specification
  ...
  
  At the end of the section describing the fit attribute, it says "The
  default value of "fill" is "hidden"."  Shouldn't it be "fit" instead of
  "fill", since "fill" is itself a possible value for "fit"?
      

• Section 4.2.3: The following should be added to the list of attributes:
  

  repeat

  Defined in Section 4.2.1

  Error Report:

  To: Philipp Hoschka <hoschka@w3.org>
  Cc: Jacco van Ossenbruggen <jrvosse@cs.vu.nl>
  Subject: Repeat attribute
  Date: Tue, 16 Jun 1998 11:16:10 +0200
  From: Lynda Hardman <Lynda.Hardman@cwi.nl>
  Content-Type: text
  Content-Length: 542
  
  
  Philipp,
  
  ....
  
  The "repeat" attribute seems to be missing from the list of attributes on
  the media object element.
  
  In the DTD it _is_ listed as one of the attributes on the media object
  element.
  
  ...
      

• Section 4.2.4.2:  In the section "Determining the implicit end of an element", in the last bullet, all occurences of "duration" should be replaced by "end". It should read as follows:
  • A "par" element has an implicit end that depends on the value of the "endsync" attribute. The implicit end is equal to the sum of the effective begin of the "par" element and the implicit duration which is derived as follows:
    • If the value of the "endsync" attribute is "last", or if the "endsync" attribute is missing, the implicit end of the "par" element is the maximum of the desired ends of its children.
    • If the value of the "endsync" attribute is "first", the implicit end of the "par" element is the minimum of the desired ends of its children.
    • If the value of the "endsync" attribute is an id-ref, the implicit end of the "par" element is equal to the desired end of the child referenced by the "id-ref".

  Error Report:

  To: ph@w3.org
  Subject: bug in time model description
  ...
  Date: Wed, 15 Jul 1998 10:59:41 +0200
  From: Sjoerd Mullender <Sjoerd.Mullender@cwi.nl>
  ...
  
  In Section 4.2.4.2 "Determining Time Model Values for SMIL 1.0
  Elements", subsection "Determining the implicit end of an element",
  last bullet, the implicit end of a par is defined.  The implicit end
  of the par depends on the ends of its children, not on the duration of
  its children since the start of the children may be delayed.  So the
  text should be:
  
  A "par" element has an implicit end that depends on the value of the
  "endsync" attribute.  The implicit end is derived as follows:
  - If the value of the "endsync" attribute is "last", or if the
    "endsync" attribute is missing, the implicit end of the "par"
    element is the maximum of the desired ends of its children.
  - If the value of the "endsync" attribute is "first", the implicit end
    of the "par" element is the minimum of the desired ends of its
    children.
  - If the value of the "endsync" attribute is an id-ref, the implicit  
    end of the "par" element is equal to the desired end of the child
    referenced by the "id-ref".
  ...
      

• Section 4.2.4.2: In the Section "Determining the effective end of an element", at the bullet starting with "The effective end of any other child of a "seq" element ...", the second sub-bullet should read:
  • If the child has a "fill" attribute, and the value of the "fill" attribute is "remove", the effective end of the child element is the minimum of the effective begin of the next element and the desired end of the child element.

  Error Report:

  Objet: SMIL 1.0 erratum
  Renvoyé-Date: Fri, 1 Jun 2001 04:03:02 -0400 (EDT)
  Renvoyé-De: symm@w3.org
  Date: Fri, 01 Jun 2001 10:02:46 +0200
  De: Sjoerd Mullender <sjoerd.mullender@oratrix.com>
  
  ...
  
  In section 4.2.4.2, in the subsection "Determining the effective end
  of an element" in the bullet "The effective end of any other child of
  a "seq" element...", the second sub-bullet reads:
  
  - If the child has a "fill" attribute, and the value of the "fill"
    attribute is "remove", the effective end of the child element is the
    minimum of the effective begin of the next element and the desired end
    of the next child element.
  
  The last "next" in this bullet should be removed.  The effective end
  is the minimum of the effective begin of the next element and the
  desired end of the element itself.
  
  -- Sjoerd Mullender <sjoerd.mullender@oratrix.com>
  
      

• Section 4.5.2: The following should be added to the list of attributes:
  

  href

  Defined in Section 4.5.1

  Error Report:

  To: symm@w3.org
  ...
  Date: Mon, 22 Jun 1998 17:08:29 +0200
  From: Sjoerd Mullender <Sjoerd.Mullender@cwi.nl>
  Subject: error in recommendation
  ...
  
  The href attribute is missing in the description of the anchor
  element.  It is present in the DTD and in the examples.

• Appendix: Extending SMIL 1.0: The example uses an outdated syntax for XML namespaces, and the wrong namespace identifier for the SMIL Recommendation. With corrected syntax, the example reads as follows:

  <smil xmlns:new="http://www.acme.com/new-smil"
        xmlns="http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-smil">
    <body>
      <par>
        <new:a>
        ...
        </new:a>
        <mytags:a ... />
          ...
        </mytags:a>
        <b>
         ...
        </b>
      </par>
     </body>
   </smil>
  
      

• In section 5.2 of the SMIL 1.0 DTD, the href attribute is defined as required but it should be optional for the anchor element.

  The href definition should say that href is required for a element and is optional for anchor element.

  Therefore the href definition must be moved out of smil-link-attributes and defined for each element as follows:

<!ENTITY % smil-link-attributes "
%id-attr;
%title-attr;
show (replace|new|pause) 'replace'
">

<!--=================== Inline Link Element ===============================-->

<!ELEMENT a (%schedule;|switch)*>
<!ATTLIST a
%smil-link-attributes;
href CDATA #REQUIRED
>

<!--=================== Associated Link Element ===========================-->

<!ELEMENT anchor EMPTY>
<!ATTLIST anchor
%skip-attr;
%smil-link-attributes;
href CDATA #IMPLIED
%sync-attributes;
coords CDATA #IMPLIED
>

Non-Errors

This section lists phenomena reported as errors which are not, in the judgement of those maintaining this page, in fact errors in the specification or accompanying materials.

None so far.