xml-dev - Full Disclosure II: What XML Processors Should And May Do

[John Cowan <cowan@locke.ccil.org>]

This report, like its predecessor, is gleaned from the text of the
XML 1.0 Recommendation.  Clause numbers are in parentheses.

A. An XML processor should:

accept ":" as a name-start character (2.3)
treat undeclared attributes as CDATA (3.3.3)
apply URL-encoding to URIs with invalid characters (4.2.2)
do case-insensitive recognition of encoding names (4.3.3)

B. An XML processor may, at user option:

normalize character data, Unicode-style (1.2 s.v. "match")

warn about undeclared element types in content models (3.2)
	or ATTLISTs (3.3)
warn about multiple ATTLISTs for an element or multiple
	declarations for an attribute (3.3)
warn about multiply declared entities (4.2)

C. An XML processor may, on its own decision:

provide unprocessed input to the application after a fatal error
	(1.2 s.v. "fatal error")
pass the text of comments to the application (2.5)
use public identifiers to generate alternative URIs (4.2.2, 4.8)
provide additional context-dependent information for notations (4.7)
recognize non-UTF encodings (4.3.3)
when not validating, include text of external entity in place of
	a reference (4.4.3)

warn about a bad version number in the XML declaration (2.8)
signal an error if system identifier for external entity contains
	a fragment identifier such as "#xxx" (4.2.2)
signal an error on non-deterministic content models (E)

-- 
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)

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