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3.3.2 Document References currently says: If a document is to be referred to rather than embedded, a reference to it MUST placed in the locator child of the corresponding document element. SML-IF specifies one way such references may be constructed, the documentURI element, however any representation on which the producer and consumer agree may be used. [Ed. note: the previous statement is not very portable!] I propose we change this to make documentURI the floor requirement on consumers (all consumers must support) with no ceiling and no requirements on producers, and to remove the (very ambiguous and in our specs way overloaded) term "reference". Revised text: If a document is to be referred to rather than embedded, the SML-IF producer MUST provide its location using the document/locator element. SML-IF consumers MUST accept the element defined by SML-IF for this purpose, documentURI. SML-IF producers MAY provide the location of an embedded document within the document/locator element using any means their consumers understand, including but not limited to documentURI.
At Redmond f2f, the following was agreed upon: 1. Reword the second sentence such that it uses MAY to convey that documentURI is optional 2. Add a sentence to clarify that conforming consumers are not required to locate the referred document 3. Fix typo in first sentence (add be after MUST) 4. Add sentence to encourage consumers to report messages when documents are not fetched/dereferenced
Based on the f2f agreement, replaced the existing text by the following: If a document is to be referred to rather than embedded, SML-IF producers MUST provide its location using the locator child of the corresponding document element. SML-IF specifies one way that MAY be used to provide the location of the referred document, the documentURI element. A conforming SML-IF consumer is not REQUIRED to locate a referred document. If a conforming SML-IF consumer chooses to not locate a referred document, it MAY produce a message to that effect.
> A conforming SML-IF consumer is not REQUIRED to locate a referred document. The lower case "not" is going to be easy for people to miss, and RFC 2119 does not define a "NOT REQUIRED" qualifier. Propose changing to "A conforming SML-IF consumer MAY locate a referred document. " > If a conforming SML-IF consumer chooses to not locate a referred document, it MAY produce a message to that effect. Propose changing from: MAY produce a message to that effect. to: SHOULD make its invoker aware of this condition. "message" seems overly prescriptive, and I feel (strongly) this is a should not a may. We do have some responsibility to guide implementors to do sensible things, and silently ignoring something that a human looking at the smlif instance would expect to be processed is more likely to surprise than to be expected, even if it is legal.
"A conforming SML-IF consumer MAY locate a referred document. " should also be "A conforming SML-IF consumer MAY locate a referred to document. "