xml-dev - Re: <!ENTITY amp "&38;">

[David Brownell <db@Eng.Sun.COM>]

Richard Tobin wrote:
> 
> > I was looking at the Shakespeare samples (shakespeare.1.10.xml) on
> > http://sunsite.unc.edu/pub/sun-info/xml/eg/ and noticed that the file
> > play.dtd contains the tag <!ENTITY amp "&#38;">
> 
> This is not entirely surprising, since that file is dated 31 Jan 98,
> and the XML draft current at that time specified the declaration above!
> 
> IE 5 appears to be within its rights not to detect the error (in the
> declaration, not the use, of the entity).  Section 4.6 says that amp
> "must" be declared as "&#38;#38;", and violation of "must" is an "error"
> which "may" be detected.

This is one of those areas where the XML spec gives too much (IMHO)
leeway in terms of error reporting.  While I think IE5 is doing a
legal thing here, there's not much reason not to fully recover from
this error in all cases, since "amp" is predefined and the original
definition trumps the others.  Most other parsers in fact adopt a
rather different legal way to handle this error:  ignore it totally!

- Dave

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