Re: [xml-dev] What is @xml:space about?

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

John P. McCaskey scripsit:

> Is there an established way for an XML document to announce to
> downstream processors what "default" processing -- trim, collapse,
> pre-line, nowrap, etc. -- was assumed in the encoding?  

No, there isn't.  What counts as the Right Thing depends on the consuming
application.  The point of xml:space="preserve" is to persuade the
consumer that the producer intends for the whitespace to convey important
information.  The alternative is that the producer doesn't really care.

So if the producer wants to make sure that whitespace is normalized,
the best approach is to do its own normalization and then add
xml:space="preserve" to prevent the consumer from doing its own thing
with it.

-- 
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      That thou wast born with.