Re: ISSUE-2147 (external-refs confusing): Section on externally referenced documents confusing [Last Call: SVG 1.2 Tiny]

Hello all.

Cameron McCormack:
> >   Each primary document maintains a dictionary that maps IRIs to
> >   resource documents.  This dictionary is used whenever a resource
> >   document is to be loaded because the primary document or one of its
> >   resource documents references it.  Before loading a resource document,
> >   its IRI is first looked up in the primary document’s dictionary to
> >   determine if it has already been loaded.  If so, then that
> >   already-loaded document is used instead of creating a separate
> >   document instance.  Thus, for each primary document, a given resource
> >   document is loaded only once.  Primary documents, however, are always
> >   separate, self-contained document instances, and resource documents
> >   are not shared between primary documents.

Erik Dahlström:
> I disagree with this, and I think similar wording is also in the
> other proposal and in the spec currently. Specifically I'd like the
> spec to avoid requiring reloading of the same resource if the primary
> documents are in the same document (the inline in XHTML case).
>
> One solution could be to remove the mention of the document fragment
> case and to fix that in a later spec. Another would be to say that a
> primary document is the document itself, and this would also work for
> the other cases since they would all establish a new document. Yet
> another would be to add a sentence saying that resource documents may
> be shared among primary documents if the primary documents are inline
> in the same document.

After discussion in the working group, we agreed with Erik’s suggestion
to have resource documents shared between SVG document fragments within
the one document (although note that each SVG document fragment within
the one non-SVG document still has its own timeline).

> > And a question: should resource documents be restricted to being entire
> > SVG documents, or can they be SVG document fragments within say an XHTML
> > document?
> 
> Any document capable of providing the necessary svg elements (in
> the proper namespace) should be allowed as the container IMHO. This
> wouldn't rule out HTML5 documents, if the elements were put in the DOM
> correctly.

This was agreed to also.

Here is my proposed rewording, incorporating these two changes, which
has also been committed to the spec:

  14.1.6 Processing of external references to documents
  
  When an SVG user agent resolves an external reference to a document,
  how the document is loaded and processed depends on how the document
  was referenced. As defined below, a document is classified as either
  a primary document or a resource document, and this classification
  determines the document's processing with respect to loading of
  external references.
  
  A primary document is one that is to be presented in whole by the user
  agent. Specifically, the following are classified as primary
  documents:

   * An entire document, be it an SVG stand-alone document or some other
     document that can contain SVG document fragments, that is loaded
     into a user agent for presentation, such as when navigating a web
     browser to an IRI, whether by typing the IRI into the browser's
     address bar, clicking on a link to that IRI, or having the
     Location::assign() method invoked. (In an HTML 5 user agent, this
     is when a document is part of a top-level browsing context
     ([HTML5], section 4.1.1).)

   * An entire SVG document that is loaded due to it being referenced by
     an 'animation' element.

   * A document that is loaded due to it being referenced for inclusion
     by a parent non-SVG document for presentation, such as using the
     HTML 'object' or 'iframe' elements.
  
  A resource document is a document that has been loaded because it is
  referenced as a resource by an SVG document fragment. Specifically,
  the following kinds of external references, all of which are
  references to elements, will cause the loaded document to be
  classified as a resource document:
  
    * The 'xlink:href' attribute on a 'use' element.
    * The 'xlink:href' attribute on a 'font-face-uri' element.
    * A paint server reference in a 'fill' or 'stroke' property.
  
  Note that neither a primary document nor a resource document need be
  a complete SVG document (with the rootmost 'svg' element being the
  document element). Both may be non-SVG documents that contain SVG
  document fragments.
  
  Each primary document maintains a dictionary that maps IRIs to
  resource documents. This dictionary is used whenever a resource
  document is to be loaded because an SVG document fragment within
  the primary document (or one of its resource documents) references
  it. Before loading a resource document, its IRI is first looked up
  in the primary document's dictionary to determine if it has already
  been loaded. If so, then that already-loaded document is used instead
  of creating a separate document instance. Thus, for each primary
  document, a given resource document is loaded only once. Primary
  documents, however, are always separate, self-contained document
  instances, and resource documents are not shared between different
  primary documents.
  
  The IRI used as the key in the dictionary of resource documents
  must be the absolute IRI after resolving it against any applicable
  base IRI, and comparisons of the dictionary keys must be performed
  using a Simple String Comparison, as defined in section 5.3.1 of
  Internationalized Resource Identifiers [RFC3987].
  
  Whether a document is a primary document or a resource document, its
  processing once loaded is the same: each SVG document fragment within
  the document acts as a separate SVG processing context in which events
  are fired, scripts are executed, an animation timeline is created
  and animations are run, stylesheets are applied (if supported by the
  SVG user agent), and so on. Since a resource document is not just a
  static DOM, any changes to it (be they modifications by script or
  changing presentation values with animation) will be visible through
  all references to that resource document.
  
  Note that since IRI references to resources from different primary
  documents will result in logically separate resource documents being
  instantiated, an SVG user agent will in general not be able to
  conserve memory by having only one instance of the resource document
  in memory. In the case that many primary documents all have references
  to a single, large, common resource file, this will likely result in
  a large amount of memory consumed. If the SVG user agent is able to
  prove that the primary documents will behave exactly the same if a
  single instance is shared in memory (by using copy-on-write semantics
  for the resource documents, for example), then such an optimization
  may of course be performed.
  
  References to any other kinds of document, such as media or external
  scripts, are not classified as primary or resource documents. Multiple
  references to media at a particular IRI always result in separate
  timelines being created.
   — http://dev.w3.org/SVG/profiles/1.2T/publish/linking.html#externalReferences

Cyril, could you please indicate as soon as possible whether you are
satisfied with this resolution.

Thanks,

Cameron
(ACTION-2345)

-- 
Cameron McCormack ≝ http://mcc.id.au/

Received on Friday, 31 October 2008 04:28:35 UTC