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Results of Questionnaire ISSUE-101: Spec reference for US-ASCII - Straw Poll for Objections
The results of this questionnaire are available to anybody.
This questionnaire was open from 2010-07-22 to 2010-07-30.
9 answers have been received.
Jump to results for question:
- Objections to the Change Proposal to change ASCII reference to point to ISO standard
- Objections to the Change Proposal to make no change and retain a link to a free of charge reference for ASCII
- Objections to the Change Proposal to replace HTML5's current ASCII reference with a link to ECMA-6's homepage
1. Objections to the Change Proposal to change ASCII reference to point to ISO standard
We have a Change Proposal to change the spec's ASCII reference to point to ISO standard. If you have strong objections to adopting this Change Proposal, please state your objections below.
Keep in mind, you must actually state an objection, not merely cite someone else. If you feel that your objection has already been adequately addressed by someone else, then it is not necessary to repeat it.
Details
| Responder | Objections to the Change Proposal to change ASCII reference to point to ISO standard |
|---|---|
| Grant Simpson | |
| Jonas Sicking | I object to this on the grounds that referencing a pay-for spec for ASCII will essentially make the reference useless. No one is going to bother paying for this when free copies are so readily available. So if we are referencing the pay-for copy, we are effectively not helping people out at all. And since we seem to think it is important to help people out using a reference (no one has suggested removing the reference), we should actually attempt to do so. Pointing to a reference that nobody will use does not fulfill that goal. Has anyone taking part in these discussions actually looked at the spec this proposal wants us to reference? If not, are we really expecting readers of the spec to make more effort than the writers of the spec? If so, I think that would be a first. I also object to making any changes here in general as this whole issue is a giant waste of time. If this time waste keeps happening I suggest we amend whatever needs amending to prevent further incidents like it. Since this change proposal was the one that caused this whole time waste, I'm choosing to object here. |
| Boris Zbarsky | As I see it, there are two possible reasons we might be referencing ASCII. 1) This may be a normative reference required to implement tools that work with HTML. It seems to me that such a normative reference to a pay-only specification would effectively require a royalty to implement HTML. That seems to be against at least the spirit of the W3C's approach to royalties on specifications, even if the only explicit document I can find on the matter right now is the patent policy (which doesn't apply here, clearly). It doesn't make sense that patent royalties on HTML are excluded, but other forms of royalties on basic information needed to work with HTML are acceptable. So if the reference is a normative one, it needs to be to a royalty-free definition of ASCII or needs to be eliminated in favor of importing whatever normative information is needed into the HTML specification itself. 2) This may be a normative reference in case someone doesn't know what ASCII is. In this case, requiring the reader to pay for access to the information seems unnecessary, unless we think, for some reason, that the version of ASCII the ISO publishes differs from others. Even if it does, since the reference is not normative, the differences must be irrelevant to the actual operation of HTML tools and user agents. So an informative reference to a different source is just as good for our purposes, and better for the reader. In either case, of course, we do need to make sure that the document we are referencing is stable, both in terms of content and in terms of continuing to exist. |
| Henri Sivonen | I strongly object to this change proposal. I object to changing the reference to anything that cannot be obtained as plain text, HTML or PDF free of charge by issuing an HTTP GET request. (For avoidance of doubt, I object to referencing a .pdf.zip, too.) I also object to using this heavyweight process to override the editor's discretion in an editorial matter. Could the Chairs, please, not permit Change Proposals like this one in the future? |
| James Graham | I believe we should not reference documents which are behind paywalls unless it is absolutely unavoidable. I also believe that this change proposal is disingenuous in listing "None" under negative effects since clearly hiding a reference behind a paywall would constitute a negative to anyone trying to access it. Having said that I do not believe that anyone is seriously going to try to follow the reference in the spec to learn what ASCII is. This entire issue seems to be a waste of the group's time and I am disappointed that the chairs have allowed it to come to a poll when it purely editorial, there are outstanding issues of substance, and we have missed several deadlines and revised estimates for Last Call. |
| Anne van Kesteren | Having to pay for a reference that defines ASCII is insane. That this became an issue at all is also insane imo. |
| Julian Reschke | |
| Martin Kliehm | |
| David Singer | Though this standard is hard to find, it remains the formal definition of ASCII. Perhaps we can do the sensible thing, and make this the formal reference, with a note that its successors such as the ISO and ECMA-6 documents are easier to find. The only people likely to follow this are people needing to know exactly what the standard says, and so a formal link to the standard is appropriate. For other readers who have no idea what ASCII is and need a reference (do they exist?), the note should suffice. |
2. Objections to the Change Proposal to make no change and retain a link to a free of charge reference for ASCII
We have a Change Proposal to make no change and retain a link to a free of charge reference for ASCII. If you have strong objections to adopting this Change Proposal, please state your objections below.
Keep in mind, you must actually state an objection, not merely cite someone else. If you feel that your objection has already been adequately addressed by someone else, then it is not necessary to repeat it.
Details
| Responder | Objections to the Change Proposal to make no change and retain a link to a free of charge reference for ASCII |
|---|---|
| Grant Simpson | The most important thing is for the reference to have integrity, that is to be a reference to an official specification. I have no objections whatsoever to the reference being to a freely available specification of ASCII, but if (and only if) this is a standard produced by a standards group known to have a hand in stewarding the specification of ASCII. |
| Jonas Sicking | |
| Boris Zbarsky | |
| Henri Sivonen | |
| James Graham | |
| Anne van Kesteren | |
| Julian Reschke | This change proposal does not address the original problem, being that RFC 1345 is not a usable reference for US-ASCII, as confirmed by Martin Dürst, the IETF Character Set Reviewer (linked from the original change proposal, see http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-html/2010Mar/0084.html). |
| Martin Kliehm | |
| David Singer | linking to something that in turn references ascii does not seem to be a reference to ascii itself. |
3. Objections to the Change Proposal to replace HTML5's current ASCII reference with a link to ECMA-6's homepage
We have a Change Proposal to replace HTML5's current ASCII reference with a link to ECMA-6's homepage. If you have strong objections to adopting this Change Proposal, please state your objections below.
Keep in mind, you must actually state an objection, not merely cite someone else. If you feel that your objection has already been adequately addressed by someone else, then it is not necessary to repeat it.
Details
| Responder | Objections to the Change Proposal to replace HTML5's current ASCII reference with a link to ECMA-6's homepage |
|---|---|
| Grant Simpson | The reference to ASCII should be to a group known for having had a hand in stewarding the specification of ASCII, such as ANSI or ISO. ANSI.X3-4.1986 is the standard specification. ECMA-6, while freely available (a definite positive) does not have the recognition of the ANSI specification. |
| Jonas Sicking | |
| Boris Zbarsky | |
| Henri Sivonen | I object to this change proposal, because it changes the ASCII reference to something that doesn't define ASCII in terms of Unicode code points. |
| James Graham | |
| Anne van Kesteren | This reference does not define the code points in terms of Unicode. |
| Julian Reschke | |
| Martin Kliehm | |
| David Singer | ECMA-6 is not actually the definition, but it seems entirely suitable for an informative link ('ASCII was later revised and published as ISO 646 and ECMA-6, which are more easily available') |
More details on responses
- Grant Simpson: last responded on 22, July 2010 at 12:31 (UTC)
- Jonas Sicking: last responded on 22, July 2010 at 17:37 (UTC)
- Boris Zbarsky: last responded on 23, July 2010 at 04:33 (UTC)
- Henri Sivonen: last responded on 23, July 2010 at 08:30 (UTC)
- James Graham: last responded on 23, July 2010 at 20:14 (UTC)
- Anne van Kesteren: last responded on 27, July 2010 at 08:24 (UTC)
- Julian Reschke: last responded on 28, July 2010 at 08:54 (UTC)
- Martin Kliehm: last responded on 29, July 2010 at 13:32 (UTC)
- David Singer: last responded on 30, July 2010 at 10:05 (UTC)
Everybody has responded to this questionnaire.
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