namespaced attributes, was: URIs, concrete

> I think that's a weak comparison at best

true:-)

> especially from the
> perspective (which monasticxml.org takes explicitly) that attributes are
> meta-markup, adding extra information about the nature of elements
> rather than being their children in any sense.

They may be used that way but that isn't implied by the XML spec (or
their use in SGML) If you have <img src="foo.gif"/> then the src
attribute isn't really some meta markup with extra information it's more
the other way round, the attribue is the main data carrier and the
element is just a syntaxtic device to carry the attribute and group
it with other attributes (alt etc)/

> In any event, the namespace status of child elements is clearly known,
> at least until W3C XML Schema's unqualified child elements poisons the
> context situation further.

that occured to me as I wrote the example as well, but I thought that
was just too horrible to mention at that time of night...



I think the distinction between attributes in a namespace and attributes
not in a namespace is that unnamespaced attributes are closely tied to
specififc elements.

I can go
<html:img src="foo.gif"/> but I can't go <html:p src="...">..

Conversely because Xlink attributes are in a namespace, I expect (if I'm
using the Xlink namespace at all) to stick them on anything.
If I want to make an html p into some kind of xlink then 
<html:p xlink:href="...">..

If things worked as you say that should have worked then this
distinction would not be available

<html:img src="foo.gif"/>

would be equivalent to

<html:img html:src="foo.gif"/>

which would lead me to expect to be able to put html:src on a p


<html:p html:src="...">...

or even, reversing the equivalence, 

<html:p src="...">...


David

_____________________________________________________________________
This message has been checked for all known viruses by Star Internet
delivered through the MessageLabs Virus Scanning Service. For further
information visit http://www.star.net.uk/stats.asp or alternatively call
Star Internet for details on the Virus Scanning Service.