Re: ISSUE-53: mediatypereg - suggest closing on 2009-09-03

Sam Ruby wrote:
> ...
>> 1) The IETF AFAIK hasn't made a recommendation; and I don't think it 
>> can or will. Change control for these media types is in the W3C.
>>
>> 2) I made the recommendation *because* the editor added the 
>> registration and I feel that this is not the best way to do it.
> 
> OK, so lets open bug reports or issues on what the Working Draft 
> currently states.
> ...

OK.

>>> I guess what I am asking here is:
>>>
>>>   1) Is there some significant technical issue with the approach
>>>      that has been taken, or is this simply a matter of bug reports
>>>      that have yet to be written?
>>
>> The significant issue (IMHO) is that the media types apply to all HTML 
>> languages, and the current RFC (2854) describing those takes these 
>> into account. HTML5 does not.
> 
> Just so that I'm clear, from your perspective the core issue isn't "Need 
> to update media type registrations", but rather that you believe that 
> HTML 4.01 (as a concrete example) is a separate and distinct language 
> from HTML 5.  If I am understanding correctly, I believe that's 
> fundamentally different issue than than the issue that was raised.  If 
> so, I would prefer that this issue be closed and a separate issue be 
> raised.

OK.

> [I feel compelled to disclose that I favor an approach of viewing HTML5 
> as superseding prior versions of HTML, and treating as bugs any places 
> where it doesn't adequately do so; but this in no way precludes opening 
> of new issues]

I would prefer that as well, but it's not the case for HTML5 as of now.

>> There is an existing document describing the media types, so the 
>> simplest approach would be just to update it.
>>
>> The editor has decided not to do that, but to in-line the 
>> registration. This will work as well, as long as we do not lose 
>> significant information.
>>
>>> If there are no technical issues (modulo a few bug reports, and from 
>>> what I can see, there is an agreement that these are bugs), and what 
>>> currently exists is workable, I'm inclined to recommend closing this 
>>> issue.
>>> ...
>>
>> I'm not sure what bugs you refer to. The main issue is that if the 
>> media type registration moves from RFC 2854 to HTML5, it should 
>> preserve information about earlier versions of the language -- see 
>> <http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2854#section-1>.
> 
> The bugs I was referring to was the comments that you made that Ian has 
> missed a few places, specifically meta/@scheme, and head/@profile.  Ian 
> indicated that he would get to them.  I'm just suggesting that if this 
> is important to you, perhaps bugzilla would be a reasonable way to track 
> the changes needed.

head/@profile has it's issue already 
(<http://www.w3.org/html/wg/tracker/issues/55>). I can add an issue or 
bug for meta/@scheme, but these are only the ones I happen to be aware 
of right now. Producing a complete list would be good, but is more work.

Before we do that, we probably should decide whether HTML5 is supposed 
to describe all elements/attributes of previous specs or not.

If the answer is "yes", it needs to incorporate references to past 
specs, optimally lists of elements/attributes describer over there. It 
then can take over the media type registration, and we'll also have to 
figure out how to change the status of RFC 2854 in the RFC Index.

If the answer is "no", then the media type registration should live in a 
separate document. That could be either a W3C document, or just an 
update to RFC 2854. (Which, as Larry pointed out, doesn't need to be 
done right away and wouldn't block LC).

BR, Julian

Received on Monday, 24 August 2009 12:53:33 UTC