[tei-council] constraint again : content

[Lou Burnard]

Sebastian Rahtz wrote:

>      one possibility is the verbose
> 
>         <constraint>
>           <desc>stuff</desc>
>           <content>
>              <xxxxxx/>
>           </content>
>         </constraint>
> 
>      but that makes it confusing for people who redefine the content
>      model of <content>.
> 

Who are these people and why are they redefining the content model of 
<content>? More exactly, why would they want to redefine it one way when 
it is used to express a constraint on the content model of an element, 
and another when it is used to express a constrainty on err... the 
content of an element?

I think that one of the many the nice things about our new <constraint> 
element is precisely that it is a generalization of the rather strange 
pre-existing <content> element; I regard the latter as a degenerate 
form, or very specific specialisation, of the former: in a subsequent 
release maybe we should insist on wrapping it round with a <constraint 
scheme="relaxng" type="model"> ; in this version maybe we can  insist 
that those who do wish to redefine <content> should do so: anyone for 
<constraint scheme="dtd" type="model"> (NASS)?

And, for what it's worth, my personal verbosity-vs-clarity meter comes 
down firnmly on the side of requiring <content< within <constraint>