On 9 Nov 2004, at 3:54 pm, Tim Bray wrote:
I'm having trouble understanding the angst. The latest format draft has two different elements (feed and entry) which are quite different things, but share a number of common child elements. So why is this a problem? -Tim
Because it isn't readable. No one except a machine is capable of reading two wordy near-identical definitions and taking in the subtle differences. What we're doing essentially is hiding that information. Can't we just tell them how something works in atom:head and in atom:entry.
An ideal spec layout would be:
2.1 atom:head An atom:head element MUST contain the following child elements: - Exactly 1 atom:title element - 1 or more atom:link elements - etc
2.2 atom:entry ditto
3.1 atom:link
[general atom:link definition, followed by]
In atom:head, atom:link must blah, whereas in atom:entry blah blah3.2 atom:title
...3.3 Date Constructs
[general date construct def]
3.3.1 atom:updated
3.3.2 atom:published
etcThere you go. Note I can code a feed generator just by working through the list in 2.1 and 2.2.
Graham
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