[tei-council] xml-colon-thing

[Lou Burnard]

The Character set workgroup has proposed and the Council has (I think) 
accepted that  the global lang attribute should be replaced by a global 
xml:lang attribute; likewise the Standoff WG has proposed and the 
Council is (I think) still ruminating about the notion that the global 
"id" attribute should be replaced by a global xml:id attribute.

Pondering how to actually implement these proposals in P5 without 
causing too much havoc, I have reached the conclusion that it would be 
both feasible and advisable to make the transition in a rather more 
cautious way. I am proposing to add xml:lang as an *alternative* to lang 
in the definition for  tei.global.attributes rather than as a 
replacement for it.  (And similarly xml:lang). By "alternative" here I 
mean that a given element can specify one or the other but not both 
(supplying both would in any case be impossible since both have ID 
declared values). The current ODD syntax already supports this -- we 
added it art Christian's suggestion during the Paris Meta meeting -- and 
indeed uses it for similar backwards- compatibility-reasons in the 
definition for <figure> I think. The schemas generated do exactly the 
same thing: the DTD generated may need some further hand adjustment.

I think it is a good idea to hedge our bets about the take up of W3C 
recommendations in this way, and it will definitely make the job of 
moving legacy data to P5 a whole lot easier. Not least for us!

Comments?

Lou