Re: Syntax

Julian Reschke <julian.reschke@gmx.de> Thu, 11 January 2007 15:15 UTC

Received: from [127.0.0.1] (helo=stiedprmman1.va.neustar.com) by megatron.ietf.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1H51eR-0003a6-MB; Thu, 11 Jan 2007 10:15:35 -0500
Received: from [10.91.34.44] (helo=ietf-mx.ietf.org) by megatron.ietf.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1H51eQ-0003Zr-3Z for cosmogol@ietf.org; Thu, 11 Jan 2007 10:15:34 -0500
Received: from mail.gmx.net ([213.165.64.20]) by ietf-mx.ietf.org with smtp (Exim 4.43) id 1H51eB-0000Hw-G3 for cosmogol@ietf.org; Thu, 11 Jan 2007 10:15:33 -0500
Received: (qmail invoked by alias); 11 Jan 2007 15:15:16 -0000
Received: from mail.greenbytes.de (EHLO [192.168.1.87]) [217.91.35.233] by mail.gmx.net (mp043) with SMTP; 11 Jan 2007 16:15:16 +0100
X-Authenticated: #1915285
Message-ID: <45A65484.4020008@gmx.de>
Date: Thu, 11 Jan 2007 16:15:16 +0100
From: Julian Reschke <julian.reschke@gmx.de>
User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; de; rv:1.8.0.4) Gecko/20060516 Thunderbird/1.5.0.4 Mnenhy/0.7.4.666
MIME-Version: 1.0
To: "Clive D.W. Feather" <clive@demon.net>
References: <45A20F62.9060306@gmx.de> <20070108204618.GA29407@sources.org> <20070109000704.GB17340@finch-staff-1.thus.net> <20070109081753.GA1875@nic.fr> <20070110055950.GA5608@finch-staff-1.thus.net> <45A512E8.25CC@xyzzy.claranet.de> <45A514D6.7030000@gmx.de> <45A555F1.3286@xyzzy.claranet.de> <45A55E1E.2080801@gmx.de> <45A5666F.490C@xyzzy.claranet.de> <20070111150319.GG24072@finch-staff-1.thus.net>
In-Reply-To: <20070111150319.GG24072@finch-staff-1.thus.net>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="ISO-8859-1"; format="flowed"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
X-Y-GMX-Trusted: 0
X-Spam-Score: 0.0 (/)
X-Scan-Signature: 69a74e02bbee44ab4f8eafdbcedd94a1
Cc: Frank Ellermann <nobody@xyzzy.claranet.de>, cosmogol@ietf.org
Subject: Re: Syntax
X-BeenThere: cosmogol@ietf.org
X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5
Precedence: list
List-Id: DIscussion on state machine specification in IETF protocols <cosmogol.ietf.org>
List-Unsubscribe: <https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/cosmogol>, <mailto:cosmogol-request@ietf.org?subject=unsubscribe>
List-Archive: <http://www1.ietf.org/pipermail/cosmogol>
List-Post: <mailto:cosmogol@ietf.org>
List-Help: <mailto:cosmogol-request@ietf.org?subject=help>
List-Subscribe: <https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/cosmogol>, <mailto:cosmogol-request@ietf.org?subject=subscribe>
Errors-To: cosmogol-bounces@ietf.org

Clive D.W. Feather schrieb:
> Frank Ellermann said:
>>> I simply think that inventing new notations without taking
>>> care of non-ASCII characters is a good idea.
> 
> I hope you meant "... is *NOT* a good idea"?

Yep.

>> ASCII is to some degree comptible with a future extension to
>> UTF-8.  With more or less obscure escape mechanisms we could
>> pick a bad idea.
>>  
>>> I think that what I proposed *was* native UTF-8.
>> Then we agree that we don't want any escape mechanisms _now_
>> with a chance to change our mind later if ABNF or RFCs would
>> go this way (I doubt it, but it's not absolutely clear).
> 
> I would be happy to just allow native UTF-8 at present. However, if we
> don't reserve an escape character in quoted strings now, we can never do so
> in the future. I had reservations about using & as the escape character.

Right. That's why I said we need an escape character anyway.

> Actually, on second thoughts, that's not quite true. We could do escaping
> via concatenation of constructs, something like:
> 
>     "This: " || &#1234; || " is an escaped character."
> 
> The main purpose of escape mechanisms is to allow parsers to be represented
> in pure ASCII even when they contain non-ASCII characters. If we don't see
> that as a requirement, then we don't need escape mechanisms as far as I can
> see.

I'm tempted to say let's do what everybody else does, and that IMHO 
means having an escape character...

Best regards, Julian

_______________________________________________
Cosmogol mailing list
Cosmogol@ietf.org
https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/cosmogol