[SCL] Re: XML syntax for CL

[John F. Sowa]

Murray and Tanel,

The final result of any standards project
is intended to be "egoless" in the sense
that it becomes a "committee draft" approved
by ISO, IEEE, W3C, or other standards body,
but without specific mention of who did what.

But during the development process, it is
essential to keep track of what changes are
being made and by whom.  The citations are
much more than a "courtesy" credit line.
They are essential to tell the developers
where any particular item came from, who
was responsible for it, what changes were
made, and by whom.

And even a finished standard will have
a bibliography of "normative" references,
which are usually to other standards, but
it may also have "informative" references
to other publications.

We definitely want to welcome volunteers who
are willing to do the actual hard work of
making positive contributions to the standard.
But whenever anybody makes an update to anything
that was previously done, it is essential to
point out where the original came from and
what changes were made.

And as a common courtesy, we should give each
other credit where credit is due, as one would
in any kind of academic effort.  At the end,
all the credits will be lost in some official
statement of who was on the committee during
the development process (but that statement
probably will not be on the final standards
document).

John Sowa