Re: [Encoding] false statement [I18N-ACTION-328][I18N-ISSUE-374]

On 8/27/2014 10:37 AM, Richard Ishida wrote:
> Larry, Anne, all,
>
> The spec has not yet been changed, but the wording proposal previously 
> suggested by Anne was that shown below, ie.:
> "Historically encodings and their specifications (if any) were kept 
> track of by the IANA Character Sets registry. For the purposes of 
> specifications using this specification, that registry is obsolete. "
>
> In various discussions with others, the word 'obsolete' still caused 
> difficulties, so I discussed alternatives with Addison and a number of 
> people.
>
> After several iterations, we proposed the following text to Anne for 
> the third paragraph in the Preface at 
> http://www.w3.org/TR/2014/WD-encoding-20140603/#preface:
>
> "User agents actually use a subset of the IANA Character Sets registry 
> in a particular way. This specification documents this to establish 
> interoperability on the Open Web Platform. Specifications and 
> applications using this specification must restrict themselves to the 
> encodings as documented in this specification."
>
> Anne was not comfortable with that, but did think that an alternative 
> suggested by Addison could work. That would be to replace the third 
> paragraph with:
>
> "Historically encodings and their specifications (if any) were kept 
> track of by the IANA Character Sets registry. For the purposes of 
> specifications using this specification, that registry no longer 
> relevant."
>
> The i18n WG felt that this last attempt was workable. Please let us 
> know asap whether we can settle on this wording and move on.

This last version is workable in the sense that it removes objectionable 
statements. It is, however,less relevant to the users of the specification.

I personally would find some statement along the line given in the quote 
starting with "User agents..." preferable because it addresses the issue 
from the point of view of users of the specification (as well as writers 
of derived specifications), and presents the loss of relevance of the 
IANA registry as  consequence of a particular (and important) design 
decisions and not as an axiom.

But that's just me.

A./

> Thanks,
> RI
>
>
>
>
> On 09/08/2014 17:35, Phillips, Addison wrote:
>> Hello Larry,
>>
>> In the reply below, it seems that I erred in which text recommendation
>> we wanted to make. The correct recommended text is:
>>
>> -- 
>>
>> "For the purposes of specifications using this specification, that
>>
>> registry is obsolete."
>>
>> -- 
>>
>> This text has the advantage of not trying to define what the Web is nor
>> impose artificial boundaries on where the Encoding specification should
>> be used while simultaneously avoiding saying anything about the status
>> of the IANA Charset registry (which all agree is beyond the remit of
>> Encoding as a specification).
>>
>> I regret the error. Please let us know if this text satisfies your 
>> comment.
>>
>> Addison (for I18N)
>>
>
>
>

Received on Thursday, 28 August 2014 04:17:18 UTC