[tei-council] brooding about override of class attributes

[Lou Burnard]

On 28/04/12 19:30, Sebastian Rahtz wrote:
> I am tasked with making this work:
>
>    <elementSpec ident="p">
>       <classSpec>
>         <memberOf key="att.typed"/>
>       </classSpec>
>      <attList>
>        <attDef ident="type" mode="change">
>           ….
>        </attDef>
>     </attList>
>   </elementSpec>
>
> in the Guidelines. which is OK. but what if
> we are processing an ODD which does things with
> att.typed? if it deletes @type, do we follow
> suite for<div>?
>
> can anyone philosophise on what the exact algorithm is
> which I have to implement?

Tricky. Clearly if someone deletes @type from att.typed they expect it 
to disappear from all elements which inherit their @type from it. If 
those elements inherit and subsequently modify it (which is your case) I 
think on balance the same should apply, since you cannot modify 
something without first inheriting it. If someone wants to remove the 
inherited @type globally and then reinstate a locally defined @type on 
some element or elements, then that must be done with mode='add', of 
course.

I can also anticipate people being puzzled by the fact that deleting 
@type from att.typed does not remove from elements in which @type is 
locally defined, but that's another question.