At 09:49 AM 2/12/02 -0500, Phil Griffin wrote:
>Again, I don't believe that is the case. All I'm
>saying is validate against the number, and display
>the associated alphanumeric for the user. As in
>perhaps
>
> <country name="ROU"> 647 </country>
>or
> <country name="ROM"> 647 </country>
>or
> <country name="ROU" fullName="Romania"> 647 </country>
I think it would be a good design principle to avoid duplication of data in
the instance. It presents too many opportunities for the instance creator
to mess up (with a number that doesn't match the alphanumeric, for
example), and requires us to document the semantics when there's a mismatch
and when one or the other is missing.
If the *user interface* wants to turn an unfriendly number (or
alphanumeric) into a nice spelled-out string, though, that's fair game.
Eve
--
Eve Maler +1 781 442 3190
Sun Microsystems XML Technology Center eve.maler @ sun.com