ACTION-680: Jeni to lead TAG telcon review of http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-appsawg-media-type-regs

Jeni:

You have

ACTION-680: on - Jeni Tennison - Lead TAG telcon review (rescheduled) of 
http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-appsawg-media-type-regs-04 - Due: 
2012-04-24 - PENDING REVIEW

(writing as TAG chair)

I see that there was discussion last week [1], resulting in a resolution 
that is in general supportive of the draft, along with some other proposed 
text. Accordingly, I'm assuming that those on the call would likely have 
intended to close ACTION-680?

(writing as an individual TAG member)

Had I been on the call, I would likely have pointed out my suggestion [2] 
that it would be useful to have a stronger health warning about the choice 
that subtypes SHOULD (as opposed to MUST) follow the fragment 
interpretation of a base type. To restate in brief: I think it would be 
appropriate to warn that in cases where  (specification for) the subtype 
allows for interpretation of any particular identifier(s) in a way that 
conflicts with that mandated for the base, generic processors will produce 
erroneous results. The consequences in such situations might include: (1) 
generic processors become impractical for such types (2) users are 
inconvenienced by links that do not resolve as intended (3) systems crash 
or serious errors result from the wrong data being processed.

So, I will look for comments on that between now and Thursday, and maybe 
mention it briefly on the call to see if others are moved by my suggestion. 
If not, I expect to let it go. Thank you.

Noah

[1] http://www.w3.org/2001/tag/2012/04/19-minutes#item03
[2] http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/www-tag/2012Apr/0125.html

Received on Tuesday, 24 April 2012 21:39:56 UTC