Re: Namespaces !

John Cowan (cowan@locke.ccil.org)
Tue, 04 Aug 1998 15:10:13 -0400

Patrice Bonhomme wrote:

> cowan@locke.ccil.org said:
> ] The draft also says, "The namespace declaration is considered to apply
> ] to the element where it is specified and to all elements within the
> ] content of that element, unless overridden [...]."
>
> If the draft says it..... It sounds strange. My parser reads a tag name
> (prefix+local) of an Element and has to wait for the namespace declaration to
> qualified this name. For me, it is as if we put the Element Declaration
> within the open tag of this Element, unthinkable.

Not much of a problem, really, at least for SAX-style parsers that
return the GI and the attribute map at the same time.

> cowan@locke.ccil.org said:
> ] All names beginning "xml" or "XML" or "xML" or whatever are already
> ] reserved.
>
> I agree. But 'xmlns' is not xml!

But "xmlns" *begins* with the string "xml", which is what is
reserved. *Any* name beginning with those three letters is
reserved, like "xml-foo" or "xml:bogus" or "xmlxml".

> It is a detail. I'd use :
> <?xml:namespace ns="urn:ISBN:0-395-36341-6" prefix="isbn"?>

The trouble is that PIs don't nest within the element structure,
and the whole point of the new draft (IMHO) is to localize
prefix definitions so they are not just document-global.

-- 
John Cowan	http://www.ccil.org/~cowan		cowan@ccil.org
	You tollerday donsk?  N.  You tolkatiff scowegian?  Nn.
	You spigotty anglease?  Nnn.  You phonio saxo?  Nnnn.
		Clear all so!  'Tis a Jute.... (Finnegans Wake 16.5)