Re: [xml2rfc-dev] xml2rfc would not be able to render RFC 7997

[Tom Pusateri <[e-mail]>]

I don’t think math needs separate handling. It is just an example of why you would want non-ASCII characters in paragraph text.

But as I was recently told during IESG review, it’s currently not allowed and that is unfortunate when all the work is being done to allow non-ASCII characters in other parts of the document.

Thanks,
Tom

> On Oct 15, 2019, at 2:57 PM, Heather Flanagan <[e-mail]> wrote:
> 
> Hi Tom,
> 
>> On Oct 15, 2019, at 11:51 AM, Tom Pusateri <[e-mail] <mailto:[e-mail]>> wrote:
>> 
>> If you’re to change the use of non-ascii characters in RFCs, there’s been many requests for unicode math symbols in paragraph text.
>> 
>> I feel like someone is going to shoot me for saying this but really, it’s 2019. We should be able to do ≤ instead of <=
> 
> Sure. I don’t mention math symbols explicitly in 7997; do you think they need separate handling from other non-ASCII characters? Or does 7997 need a special section just on Math?
> 
> -Heather
> 
>> 
>> Tom
>> 
>>> On Oct 15, 2019, at 2:35 PM, Heather Flanagan <[e-mail] <mailto:[e-mail]>> wrote:
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>>> On Oct 14, 2019, at 11:58 PM, Julian Reschke <[e-mail] <mailto:[e-mail]>> wrote:
>>>> 
>>>> So,
>>>> 
>>>> RFC 7997 is "The Use of Non-ASCII Characters in RFCs". In
>>>> <https://www.greenbytes.de/tech/webdav/rfc7997.html#rfc.section.3.2 <https://www.greenbytes.de/tech/webdav/rfc7997.html#rfc.section.3.2>> it
>>>> says:
>>>> 
>>>>> Example Acknowledgements section:
>>>>> 
>>>>> OLD:
>>>>> 
>>>>> The following people contributed significant text to early versions of this draft: Patrik Faltstrom, William Chan, and Fred Baker.
>>>>> 
>>>>> PROPOSED/NEW:
>>>>> 
>>>>> The following people contributed significant text to early versions of this draft: Patrik Fältström (Faltstrom), 陈智昌 (William Chan), and Fred Baker.
>>>> 
>>>> However,
>>>> <https://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-levkowetz-xml2rfc-v3-implementation-notes-09#appendix-A.1 <https://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-levkowetz-xml2rfc-v3-implementation-notes-09#appendix-A.1>>
>>>> states:
>>>> 
>>>>> A.1.  <u>
>>>>> 
>>>>>  In xml2rfc vocabulary version 3, the elements <author>,
>>>>>  <organisation>, <street>, <city>, <region>, <code>, <country>,
>>>>>  <postalLine>, <email>, <seriesInfo>, and <title> may contain non-
>>>>>  ascii characters for the purpose of rendering author names,
>>>>>  addresses, and reference titles correctly.  They also have an
>>>>>  additional "ascii" attribute for the purpose of proper rendering in
>>>>>  ascii-only media.
>>>>> 
>>>>>  In order to insert Unicode characters in any other context, xml2rfc
>>>>>  vocabulary v3 requires that the Unicode string be enclosed within an
>>>>>  <u> element.  The element will be expanded inline based on the value
>>>>>  of a "format" attribute.  This provides a generalised means of
>>>>>  generating the 6 methods of Unicode renderings listed in [RFC7997],
>>>>>  Section 3.4, and also several others found in for instance the RFC
>>>>>  Format Tools example rendering of RFC 7700, at https://rfc- <https://rfc-/>
>>>>>  format.github.io/draft-iab-rfc-css-bis/sample2-v2.html <http://format.github.io/draft-iab-rfc-css-bis/sample2-v2.html>.
>>>>> 
>>>>>  The "format" attribute accepts either a simplified format
>>>>>  specification, or a full format string with placeholders for the
>>>>>  various possible Unicode expansions.
>>>>> 
>>>>> A.1.1.  Expansion of simplified <u> format specifications
>>>>> 
>>>>>  The simplified format consists of dash-separated keywords, where each
>>>>>  keyword represents a possible expansion of the Unicode character or
>>>>>  string; use for example "<u "lit-num-name">foo</u>" to expand the
>>>>>  text to its literal value, code point values, and code point names.
>>>>> 
>>>>>  A combination of up to 3 of the following keywords may be used,
>>>>>  separated by dashes: "num", "lit", "name", "ascii", "char".  The
>>>>>  keywords are expanded as follows and combined, with the second and
>>>>>  third enclosed in parentheses (if present):
>>>>> 
>>>>>     "num"    The numeric value(s) of the element text, in U+1234
>>>>>              notation
>>>>> 
>>>>>     "name"   The Unicode name(s) of the element text
>>>>> 
>>>>>     "lit"    The literal element text, enclosed in quotes
>>>>> 
>>>>>     "char"   The literal element text, without quotes
>>>>> 
>>>>>     "ascii"  The value of the 'ascii' attribute on the <u> element
>>>>> 
>>>>>  In order to ensure that no specification mistakes can result for
>>>>>  rendering methods that cannot render all Unicode code points, "num"
>>>>>  MUST always be part of the specified format.
>>>>> 
>>>>>  The default value of the "format" attribute is "lit-name-num".
>>>> 
>>>> So, unless I'm missing something, the only way to get non-ASCII
>>>> characters into regular prose is using <u>, and using <u> implies
>>>> automatic expansion of characters to numerical representations of the
>>>> codepoints.
>>>> 
>>>> Possible solutions:
>>>> 
>>>> 1) In RFC 7997bis, remove the suggestion to allow non-ASCII names in
>>>> Acknowledgements etc.
>>>> 
>>>> 2) Relax the requirements for <u> so that it doesn't *need* to be used
>>>> in prose.
>>>> 
>>>> 3) Relax the requirement about output formats for <u>.
>>>> 
>>>> My preference would be 2) or 3).
>>> 
>>> I agree that 1) is not ideal - won’t go that route.
>>> 
>>> I like 3) over 2) because the point of <u> is to help be clear in text that might be semantically important for the spec about what characters are being used. If we just say “any prose”, I feel like that might open us up to the confusion we’re trying to avoid. Does that make sense?
>>> 
>>> I haven’t added <u> to the 7991bis doc. I’m currently looking at reverting <seriesInfo> as per https://github.com/rfc-format/draft-iab-xml2rfc-v3-bis/issues/7 <https://github.com/rfc-format/draft-iab-xml2rfc-v3-bis/issues/7>, so I’m not far away from <u>. 
>>> 
>>> -Heather
>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> Best regards, Julian
>>>> 
>>>> PS: tracked for now at
>>>> <https://trac.tools.ietf.org/tools/xml2rfc/trac/ticket/416 <https://trac.tools.ietf.org/tools/xml2rfc/trac/ticket/416>>
>>>> 
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