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Thomas B. Passin wrote:
> Bob Foster wrote:
>
>> Joe Fawcett wrote:
>> > I'm having trouble working out from
>> > http://www.w3.org/TR/2001/REC-xmlschema-2-20010502/#anyURI
>> > [shown at bottom of mail]
>> > means that anyURI can be an empty string, can someone elucidate?
>>
>> If it couldn't, it would be wrong. An empty string is a valid URI.
>>
>
> How's that? RFC 2396 requires a scheme followed by a colon (for an
> absolute URI), or at least one character for a relative URI -
>
> rel_path = rel_segment [ abs_path ]
>
> rel_segment = 1*( unreserved | escaped |
> ";" | "@" | "&" | "=" | "+" | "$" | "," )
>
> So you have to have at least one character...
I certainly don't fault you for this comment. RFC 2396 should earn its
place in history as an example of how not to write a specification mere
mortals can understand. Here's the relevant part:
"C.2. Abnormal Examples
"Although the following abnormal examples are unlikely to occur in
normal practice, all URI parsers should be capable of resolving them
consistently. Each example uses the same base as above.
"An empty reference refers to the start of the current document.
"<> = (current document)"
The RFC specifically allows for an empty reference; in fact, it defaults
to an empty reference (5.2.7).
Bob Foster
http://xmlbuddy.com/
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