Introduction
This page is for guidance to tool authors on ensuring compatibility between tools, and between tools and data.
Archetype Tools
The ".v1draft" Archetype Identifier problem
The issue:
- archetype identifiers with version ids of the form .v1draft were allowed in early tools, and caused a proliferation of archetypes with these identifiers. This form of identifier was never legal in the Reference Model specification. Release 1.0.2 (Support Information Model) corrects the regular expressions used to match archetype identifiers, and provides guidance on archetype identifiers. The issue for tools is that they should be brought up to date to this specification, but still allow the .v1draft style of identifier for some time, until all archetype users have declared that the issue is gone.
Plan:
- as of September 2008, when Release 1.0.2 is published, builders of archetype and other tools processing archetype identifiers should allow the .v1draft form, preferably indicating it with a warning.
Status: OPEN
Ontology term_bindings and constraint_bindings Sections (ADL form of archetypes only)
The issue:
- due to SPEC-284, a few existing ADL archetypes only have misnamed subsections in the ontology section: term_binding should be term_bindings; constraint_binding should be constraint_bindings (i.e. both in the plural).
The solution:
- Tools should accept both spellings for some time and automatically convert to the new spelling where safe to do so on saving.
Status: OPEN
dADL Type Specifiers
The issue:
- The type specifiers defined in dADL in ADL 1.4 is enclosed in parentheses. However, historically, archetype editing tools did not support this, and allowed numerous archetypes containing inline dADL sections (mainly to represent Quantity constraints) to be created without the parentheses. Tools upgrading to Release 1.0.2 should still allow the non-parenthesised form, but output a warning.
Plan:
- when all archetype users have a tool that correctly detects and warns for the non-parenthesised form of a dADL type specifier, a form of the tools should be released (or perhaps via runtime switches) that automatically corrects old archetypes.
- online archetype repositories should run such a tool across all archetypes, upgrading them to the new form by parenthesising all type specifiers in dADL sections.
Status: OPEN
