OASIS Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) TC

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  • 1.  Reviews of Spec sections

    Posted 03-02-2025 22:30
    Greetings!

    I volunteered to review two sections.

    DITA terminology, notation, and conventions

    Similar to Stan, I believe that these sections are ready for review.

    I'm a little confused why this is a separate section from the Introduction. Shouldn't all the terminology be together? Why is the RFC-2119 stuff up in the introduction only? I get that the SHOULD/MUST etc. stuff is not DITA-specific, but if I'm searching for why the formatting for SHOULD is different, I'd be confused that it isn't in the Notation section.

    I will admit it's hard to read through definitions, just reading through a glossary. If I'm not reading the context, it's hard to know why these terms are pulled out, or if the definitions are correct. I had difficulty understanding the nuance between a thing and the thing type.


    Indirect key-based addressing

    • I'm not sure everything has been looked at with new elements, such as <keytext>
    • Why is keydef not mentioned until the examples?
    • Core concepts for working with keys needs an edit by folks who understand the details.
      Potentially a venn diagram for key spaces and scopes might help.
    • The @keyref attribute - needs an edit. What does "late bound" mean? (Also, since the dita-ot has the filter-stage property, do you need to talk about how that can relate to ditavals? Does that go here?)
      What does bound mean?
    • Using keys for addressing - example needs a touch of revision to be more precise. Show the syntax for the xref.
    • Key scopes - I am going to keep asking for diagrams. I get lost in the words and would appreciate a visual.
      I'm not someone writing processors, but I am confused by the example. I don't understand how you would identify a key scope by A and B.
    • I get that you can have multiple key names or key scope names by spaces, but why would you?
    • The @keyscope attribute - needs an example section?
      I get that it works, but I don't see why I would do it.
    • Addressing Keys by scopes - what's a qualified or unqualified key definition? Should that be up in Core concepts? Needs a copy edit as well
    • Cross-deliverable addressing and linking - needs an edit. And it should be more explicit if the two examples are related.
      Is @scope="peer" behavior similar between links and maps? Do we even ever discuss a peer map outside of keys? I only found one reference for when dealing with ditavals. (off topic, what is the point of scope=peer for a plain topicref ?)
    • Processing key references - needs an edit. What's a key name? Why isn't that listed in the core concepts?
      What about that backwards compatibility note? Is this behavior changing?
      Reusing a topic in multiple key scopes is missing information
      Why is the error condition "May"?
    • Processing key references for navigation links and images - needs an edit, including title. what about <audio>, <video>, and the other elements in the multi-media domain? Why does <object> use @datakeyref? How about resolving mailto: links?
      Also link to where alt text comes from? That you can resolve both the image and the alt text?
    • Processing key references on <topicref> elements - needs an edit. What is a level of key reference? Is that a key referring to a key referring to a key? or how nested referenced maps are? Does the amount of nesting need to be mentioned for topicrefs in general?
      I'd like a combining metadata example somewhere.
    • Processing key references to generate text or link text - Needs an edit.
      So, if you need an image with a longdescref, better to use a conkeyref? I honestly can't remember, now with <keytext> we no longer support <keywords><keyword>? does that behavior change and now if it's a topicref with a link, the keywords are used as metadata?
    • Examples: Key definitions for variable text - needs to be reworked for <keytext>
      If you use a <keyword> to reference a key with an href, it will become a link? You don't have to use an <xref>? Does any element become a link, or only certain ones?
    • Example: Key definition with key reference - why would you do this? I don't know why I'd set a map up like this. I do see why I would do this in conkeyref examples.
    • Example: Links from <term> or <keyword> elements - If there are special behaviors for special elements, shouldn't that be described outside of the examples?
    • Example: Keys and collaboration - probably needs an edit, or I need more coffee to review.
    I skipped the key scope examples for now.

    hope this helps
    Zoë