DocBook Technical Committee Meeting Minutes: 19 November 2008
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The DocBook Technical Committee met on Wednesday,
19 November 2006 at 1:00p EST (10:00a PST, 18:00GMT,
18:00BST, 19:00CEST, 03:00JST+, 11:30p India+) for 65
minutes.
1. Roll call
Present: Paul Grosso, Scott Hudson, Dick Hamilton,
Gershon Joseph, Jirka Kosek, Larry Rowland, Bob Stayton,
Norm Walsh.
Absent: Jim Earley, Keith Falhgren, Patricia Gee, Nancy
Harrison, Corey Leong, Dave Pawson, John Pederson,
Pine Zhang
We have a quorum of voting members.
2. Accpeted the minutes [1] of the previous meeting (September).
3. Next meeting: 17 December 2008
No regrets.
4. Review of the agenda.
5. Review of open action items
a. Bob to organize TDG reading after names are fixed.
CONTINUE
b. Bob to add agenda item for using a map for modular DocBook.
DONE
c. Norm to write up a backwards compatibility policy document.
CONTINUE
d. Gershon to communicate with JoAnne Hackos regarding adoption committee.
CONTINUE
e. Norm to incorporate group parameter change (RFE 1998852) into the
schema
for 5.1.
CONTINUE
f. Norm to ask mailing list about 'rep' on methodparam.
CONTINUE
g. Bob to follow up with Norm regarding submittal to OASIS.
CONTINUE
h. Jirka to analyze RelaxNG without Schematron.
DONE
i. Larry to investigate RFE 2100736 (initializer should allow constants).
DONE
6. DocBook TC charter review.
Needs an update regarding the activities of the Publishing
Subcommittee.
ACTION: Dick to review and propose changes
7. DocBook 5.0 standards update
It is now a Committee Specification. For the OASIS
Standard, We are waiting for a third
corporate member to declare they are using DocBook 5.
ACTION: Norm to update the OASIS site for 5.0 spec and schem.
8. Public and system identifiers for DocBook 5.0 DTD.
Bob mentioned that we don't have a public identifier for
the DocBook 5.0 DTD. Although the DTD is not the normative
standard, people still use it and need a consistent public
identifier. Also, versions 4 always included a URL to
a copy of the DTD that can be used as a default system
identifier. We should add that for 5.0 as well.
ACTION: Norm to update the spec to include the public and
system identifiers.
9. Discussion of RelaxNG without Schematron (Jirka).
Jirka posted a comparison table of the various schema. The latest
version is dated 18 November 2008 [2]. The concern is
that not all tools support the normative standard of
RelaxNG with Schematron rules.
Norm pointed out that the automated conversion from RelaxNG
to DTD and XML Schema forms is faulty. He suggested we
might hand build and maintain those schemas to maximize
their fidelity to the RelaxNG normative standard.
Or we could wait until James Clark updates Trang to
make the conversions more complete.
Gershon asked how many users there are for DTD and XML Schema.
Gershon also suggested that since some tools don't support RelaxNG,
perhaps XML Schema should be the normative standard because
it is supported by more tools.
Bob pointed out that the RelaxNG schema is very easy
to customize, and currently the DTD and XML Schema are not
because they are mechanically generated and have a flat
structure.
ACTION: Norm to ask James Clark if a Trang update will work better.
ACTION: Bob will ask the mailing list who is using 5.0, which
validation tool they are using, and why using DTD or XML Schema
instead of RelaxNG.
ACTION: Jirka to add the schema comparison table to
the DocBook 5.0 Transition Guide.
10. Policy for backwards compatible changes (Norm).
Continued.
11. Publishing Subcommittee report (Scott).
The committee has been meeting. They addressed some
comments from Norm, and are considering items for drama
documents. They are also considering using Dublin Core
metadata element names with the DC namespace inside the
info element, and maybe making the DC elements mutually
exclusive with the corresponding DocBook elements to
avoid duplication and confusion.
12. DocBook Adoption Committee proposal (Gershon).
Continued.
13. Using a map for modular DocBook (Dick and Jim).
Continued.
14. Review of Requests for Enhancement
To browse a specific RFE, enter the URL (on one line):
http://sourceforge.net/tracker/index.php?func=detail&
group_id=21935&atid=384107&aid=XXXX
These RFEs postponed until after 5.0 release
1097183 Allow Task as a sibling of sections
1679665 Add better support for modular documentation
1722935 DocBook 5: Adding proofreader in @class for othercredit?
1770787 Rename firstname and surname
1907003 biblioid content model too broad
ACTION: Bob to move the above RFEs to the general list
for the next agenda.
RFEs to be considered
2021383 Is 'rep' on methodparam a mistake?
Continued.
2067915 add floatstyle attribute to sidebar
Approved for 5.1.
ACTION: Norm to add to 5.1 schema.
2100736 initializer should allow constants
Larry presented evidence that the element should have a
more complete content model. Generally accepted, but we
need a detailed content model proposal.
ACTION: Norm to write up a content model proposal for initializer.
2132238 add a poem element
Denied, because the Publishing Subcommittee is addressing this.
Suggested the submittor contact the Subcommittee.
2315507 subtitle in sidebar
Approved for 5.1.
ACTION: Norm to add to 5.1 schema.
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[1] http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/docbook-tc/200809/msg00002.html
[2] http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/docbook-tc/200811/msg00004.html
Bob Stayton
Sagehill Enterprises
bobs@sagehill.net