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-----Original Message----- From: edwsm@u... <edwsm@u...> >There's another school which holds that "syntax IS semantics". > >A DTD for X.509 certificates allows me to express what parts of the >certificate I consider required, what parts of the certificate I consider >optional, as well as the legal forms of the parts themselves. > >I can tell whether or not a certificate is valid, and also *why* (e.g. no >signature algorithm name was provided, the "not after" date was malformed). >I think that if I can answer "why" questions, I'm operating in the semantic >realm. > >Meaning may only be conveyed (manifested?) in "running code or >human-readable prose", but the meaning is latent in the syntax, and >couldn't be conveyed if it wasn't already there. > You can tell if the "not after" date is valid or not (syntax), but you can't tell for what reason it has been included at all, what role it plays in the system (semantics). The meaning is not "latent in the syntax" at all. Tom Passin xml-dev: A list for W3C XML Developers. To post, mailto:xml-dev@i... Archived as: http://www.lists.ic.ac.uk/hypermail/xml-dev/ and on CD-ROM/ISBN 981-02-3594-1 To unsubscribe, mailto:majordomo@i... the following message; unsubscribe xml-dev To subscribe to the digests, mailto:majordomo@i... the following message; subscribe xml-dev-digest List coordinator, Henry Rzepa (mailto:rzepa@i...)
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