I agree that an XML namespace is not a URI, but based on this from the
XML namespace spec:
[1][Definition: An XML namespace is identified by a URI reference
[RFC3986]; element and attribute names may be placed in an XML namespace
using the mechanisms described in this specification.]
It is clear that a the string used to specify the namespace, its
namespace name, is a URI. It may be a URI that is constrained as to its
possible contents, but it is still a URI.
So, as Jirka pointed out the best way, IMHO, is to use <uri
type="xmlnamespace"> when referring to an XML namespace using its
namespace name.
Again from the spec:
[1][Definition: For a name N in a namespace identified by a URI I, the
namespace name is I.]
[1] http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-xml-names
Cheers,
Eric
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Jirka Kosek [mailto:]
> Sent: Thursday, March 08, 2007 7:04 AM
> To: Peter Ring
> Cc:
> Subject: Re: [docbook] namespace markup
>
> Peter Ring wrote:
>
> > In short: an XML namespace name looks a lot like an URI, and an XML
> > namespace declaration look a lot like assigning a value to an
> > attribute. But you cannot really infer much about the
> semantics of XML
> > namespaces from that. An XML namespace name is not a type of URI.
>
> While I not disagree with you, I think that this reasoning is
> quite sort of mental gymnastic.
>
> If you have namespace in your document you don't see abstract
> concept of namespace you see URI, and best what you can do is
> to markup it as a URI and say that this particular URI is
> used as namespace name.
>
> This is also suggested in TDG5:
>
> http://www.docbook.org/tdg5/en/html/uri.html
>
> URI are simply used for too many things nowadays and it is
> unreasonable to have separate element name for each such usage.
>
> Jirka
>
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