xml-dev - Re: XSchema Question 2: Namespaces

[Dan Brickley <Daniel.Brickley@bristol.ac.uk>]

On Tue, 2 Jun 1998, Lisa Rein wrote:

> your comments)  I have a burning question -- 
> 
> You mentioned that we don't have to pick such a prefix -- then please
> clarify my inquiry regarding the unique prefixes for RDF and RDF Schema
> that -- if I understand correctly -- are very much required.
> 
> Is it an "RDF thang?"


>From http://www.w3.org/TR/WD-rdf-syntax/#transporting

[....]
The syntax descriptions below use the Extended Backus-Naur Form notation
as defined in section 6, Notation, of [XML] to
describe the essential RDF syntax elements. 

The EBNF here is condensed for human readability; in particular, the
italicized "rdf" is used to represent a variable namespace name rather 
than the more precise BNF notation "'<' NSname ':...'" and
the requirement that the property and type names in end-tags exactly match
the names in the corresponding start-tags is implied
by the XML rules. 

[...]

RDF serialization syntax takes the form:
  [1] RDF            ::= '<rdf:RDF>' expression* '</rdf:RDF>'

[end of excerpt]


('rdf' in the above is italicised in the original HTML.)


At first glance this looks as if 'rdf' is hardcoded as the 
namespace prefix, but I think this is just an artifact of the 
convenience shorthand being adopted. 
The phrase "'rdf' is used to represent a 
variable namespace name" makes it pretty clear that other 
prefixes could be used instead.

Dan


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