OASIS Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) TC

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  • 1.  Behavior of

    Posted 03-03-2009 19:30
    Hello,
    
    As requested at today's TC meeting, I'm sending a summary of the  issue
    and resolution.
    
    The issue is that the DITA specification is silent on whether authors or
    rendering tools / style sheets should add quotation marks when using the
     element. As noted earlier, the latest draft of XHTML 2 says that
    authors or style sheets should add quotes; a draft of HTML 5 appeared to
    suggest that quotes should be added by the author inside of .
    
    After speaking to IBM's representatives on the XHTML and HTML groups, we've
    found that the most recent HTML 5 draft actually states that quotation
    marks must not be added by the author; instead they must be added by user
    agents (such as stylesheets). Don Day, as chair of the DITA TC, is going to
    write to the XHTML / HTML groups pointing out that they appear to be
    diverging on the  element, in that XHTML still allows authors to enter
    the characters; both allow for stylesheets.
    
    Given our lack of stance on this in the past, and our statements of
    backwards compatibility, I'm reluctant to say DITA authors must or must not
    do something. So, based on our understanding of the X/HTML path, and based
    upon expectations expressed on this list, I would suggest the following:
    The DITA specification should recommend that authors do not add quote
    punctuation on their own, and that rendering tools or stylesheets should
    add appropriate styling (such as locale-specific quotation marks).
    
    Thanks -
    
    Robert D Anderson
    IBM Authoring Tools Development
    Chief Architect, DITA Open Toolkit