Jeremy Haile wrote:
> Why do you think that this solution is specific to my needs? I actually
> think this is a general purpose solution.
I see people have very varying needs of reference integrity. For
example, some people want a scoped reference integrity, where a token
binds to another portion of XML within the same "container". i.e.,
<domain name="sfbay">
<host name="skyblue" owned-by="bhakti" />
<user name="bhakti" real-name="Bhakti Mehta" />
...
</domain>
<domain name="east">
<host name="skyblue" owned-by="bhakti" />
<user name="bhakti" real-name="Bhakti Mandava" />
...
</domain>
Some times people want multiple symbol spaces scoped to the whole
document (like you do), yet there are multiple types in a single symbol
space --- for example, a reference to a "machine" could be either Apple,
Solaris, or PC.
And of course what you are doing is also reasonably common.
What I'm saying is that just supporting your use case would put us into
a difficult position of explaining why we can do it for you but not for
all the other people who have similar but different needs (whereas our
current position is quite easily justifiable --- we support XML ID/IDREF
semantics.)
--
Kohsuke Kawaguchi
Sun Microsystems kohsuke.kawaguchi_at_sun.com