XML and HTML Intermixed

[Peter Murray-Rust]

In message <Nn+R1EAwr3szEwGG at light.demon.co.uk> Richard Light writes:
> In message <8543 at ursus.demon.co.uk>, Peter Murray-Rust
> <Peter at ursus.demon.co.uk> writes
> >...
> >(e) Can I use XML-ised HTML and include XML-LINKs to other XML
> documents?
> >       Yes, if the HTML has been extended to use XML-LINK.  This is
> what I
> >do to avoid namespace clashes.  It may have its detractors. Be warned
> that 
> >there is not much software which can display XML documents using two
> different
> >DTDs at the same time; I'm working out how JUMBO will do this - if I
> get some
> >answers to my LINK queries it should be fairly straighforward.
> >...
> >To summarise, I believe that mix-and-match from different DTDs is a valid and
> >useful approach to XML.  It means that there can be 'islands of validity'
> >[an idea from the WG] within XML documents, so that XML-WF docs will not
> >be semantically void tag soup.  The difficulty at present is how those
> >islands are identified - there is no consensus yet.
> 
> I would suggest, looking at the XML-Link spec, that the clean way to mix
> and match is to use simple links with the attribute specifications: 
> 
>         SHOW="EMBED" ACTUATE="AUTO"
> 
> Have your chunk of HTML as a separate document (which can be valid or
> well-formed, as you wish), and just point to it. This is a fragment from
> an object record in a museum catalogue, where the artist's biographical
> details are stored in a separate XML document with a different DTD:

This is exactly what I was suggesting above in (e).  I only didn't put in the
details because I have posted them in gory detail a few postings ago under
'Re: XML-LINK'.  
> 
> <production>
>  <person ROLE="artist">Mathias, William
>   <description HREF="mathiasw.xml" SHOW="EMBED" ACTUATE="AUTO"/>
>  </person>
> 
> On hitting the empty <description> element, the XML processor will go
> off and read mathias.xml. This will be parsed separately, and probably
> held separately in memory.  It is a genuinely separate document with its
> own namespace and so on.  But _for_the_purposes_of_display_and_processin
> g_ it is 'inserted' into the source document at the point the
> <description> element occurs.  And ACTUATE="AUTO" says that it is, in

This is what I am waiting for guidance on :-).  Some people such as Eliot
(and I as a humble follower), see 'resource' as a point.  Others appear to
use 'resource' to represent a finite piece of information.  If the latter
is, in fact, the ERB's view, then the question of where to 'insert' the
other information is critical.

If you find my earlier analysis useful, I'd be grateful for comments as this 
would give me confidence to implement it (or not!).
 
	P.

-- 
Peter Murray-Rust, domestic net connection
Virtual School of Molecular Sciences
http://www.vsms.nottingham.ac.uk/

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