xml-dev - Re: Foreign Names

[Rick JELLIFFE <ricko@geotempo.com>]

Tim Bray wrote:
> 
> At 09:57 AM 4/18/00 -0500, Paul Prescod wrote:
> >Tim Bray wrote:
> >> <pedantic>they're not "tag names" dammit,
> >> they're "element types"</pedantic>.  -T.
> >If we are going to be pedantic, isn't it "element type names"?
> 
> Oh boy!  A pedentry contest!
 
And in XML Schemas (at least in the earlier versions) it has been
further messed up
so that there is a distinction between the "tag" and the "type":
"element type" is something that exists independent of its use by an
element declaration or element instance.  (In other words, SGML's
"architecture" became XML Schema's "element type",
SGML's "element type" became (for a while) XML Schema's "element" and
SGML's "element" became XML Schema's "element" err or perhaps "element
instance".  Things have been cleaned up a bit now: the spec uses
"element declaration" very consistantly.

In the ISO specs, the original term was "generic identifier" which
related to its 
function in a generalized markup methodology rather than the mechanics
of how it fitted in with DTDs. However, this fell out of favour so that
the term "element type identifier" came in.  But it seems that with XML
Schemas, there is good reason to go back to nice old "generic
identifier".  

The most we can say with XML schemas is that the GI ultimately nominates
an element type, rather than being the name of one or naming it.  Can I
claim the pedantry crown, so highly prized?

Rick Jelliffe

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