Short version: The reluctance to adopt a SCHEME attribute on the META
element for the Cougar draft of HTML[1] was based largely on a concern
of potential conflicts with other metadata efforts within W3C.
After some investigation, I find that this concern is unfounded, and
I will try to make this clear to the involved folks so that the SCHEME
proposal can go ahead.
[1] http://www.w3.org/pub/WWW/MarkUp/Cougar/
Details:
Misha Wolf wrote:
>
> I have just sent the appended mail to the mailing list of the W3C HTML
> working group. ...
> >I am very critical of last week's decision to remove from Cougar the SCHEME
> >attribute of META.
To be precise, the issue was left unresolved pending investigation.
> > This approach was agreed by the DC-4 workshop in Canberra
> >three months ago. At the time, we were given the impression that the
> >workshop's recommendations would be favourably received. Many people went
> >ahead on that basis and started implementing. The opposition to the SCHEME
> >attribute at the HTML WG meeting came as a complete surprise to me and so I
> >hadn't come equipped with evidence of usage.
The timing is somewhat unfortunate. While these issues are old hat to
many
readers of these lists, the draft with SCHEME and PROFILE attributes was
somewhat new to the W3C HTML WG. The meeting was uncomfortably short --
I
would have much preferred to give somebody 20 minutes to present the
work.
The HTML working group is working hard to
finish the Cougar draft of HTML[1] and in this climate, proposals to add
a
language features are met with considerable resistance as a rule.
To complicate matters, the relationship of PROFILE and SCHEME to the
recent work in the PICS working group wasn't clear in the draft.
>From a casual reading of the draft, some folks grew concerned that
this work would conflict with technical developments in PICS.
We didn't have the time (or perhaps we just didn't take the time)
to explain that in fact PROFILE and SCHEME are not really new or
novel at all, and that they are completely compatible with a variety
of metadata tools and techniques, not the least of which is the
recent PICS work.
I will be working with both the editors of the Cougar draft (Dave
Raggett
and Arnaud Le Hors) and the PICS WG chair/editors (Eric Miller and Ralph
Swick) to make it clear that the two mechanisms are consistent.
--
Dan Connolly, W3CHTML Working Group Chair
http://www.w3.org/People/Connolly/
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