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Re: [ddlm-group] Data-name character restrictions - one last time
- To: Group finalising DDLm and associated dictionaries <ddlm-group@iucr.org>
- Subject: Re: [ddlm-group] Data-name character restrictions - one last time
- From: "Herbert J. Bernstein" <yaya@bernstein-plus-sons.com>
- Date: Wed, 9 Dec 2009 11:02:42 -0500
- In-Reply-To: <20091209144035.GB29341@emerald.iucr.org>
- References: <20091209144035.GB29341@emerald.iucr.org>
Personally, I would greatly prefer to allow all data names that do not create a major lexer/parser conflict to appear in a data CIF and only apply the strong restrictions to data names that appear in CIF2 dictionaries as defined data names (not as aliases). -- Herbert At 2:40 PM +0000 12/9/09, Brian McMahon wrote: >I have one remaining niggle that I'd like to revisit before we put >this finally to bed. As has been mentioned a couple of times >recently, restricting the data-name character set does invalidate >syntactically many existing CIF 1 files (e.g. _refine_ls_shift/esd_max ). >We have discussed strategies for handling this, and I think these >are workable strategies, but will involve investment and hence expense >in workflow management in CIF archives. > >I understand the rationale behind this restriction is to simplify >future processing of data names in areas such as dREL >applications. The question really is whether we're choosing the right >trade-off in making things cleaner at that end of the processing >chain. I would suppose that a dREL or other application could ingest a >data name with dangerous characters, convert it internally into a >"safe" identifier that's used for all processing, and then restore the >original form upon output; but writing that intermediate layer of >processing is of course expensive (especially if there aren't readily >available libraries that will do this transparently). > >I suspect that some of the original proposed syntactic changes also >had the effect (whether by design or collaterally) of simplifying i/o, >data structure management, symbol table processing etc., but those may >have suffered in the subsequent revision exercise we've just been >practising. Given the consensus we are now approaching, would the code >builders now be prepared to incur the addition expense of handling >"dangerous" data names? > >I really don't want to spark off a long discussion on this - if a >quick round of response shows that there's no appetite to allow >the additional punctuation characters in data names, I'll accept that >gracefully. > >*** > >One last comment while I have the floor, though it is related in part >to the above question. A concern raised in the editorial office was >that there would be circumstances where users didn't know if they were >dealing with a CIF 1 or 2 ("users" meaning authors, perhaps resorting >to the vi editor - and we're imagining most of them are dealing with >small-molecule/inorganic CIFs). My supposition is that the IUCr >editorial offices would only want to use CIF2 seriously in association >with DDLm dictionaries, and that we would expect the revised core >dictionaries to use the dot component in data names to signal this >further evolution. So even a superficial glimpse of the middle of a >CIF would make it clear whether it was CIF1 or CIF2. > >Does that fit in with how others see this progressing? > >Cheers >Brian >_______________________________________________ >ddlm-group mailing list >ddlm-group@iucr.org >http://scripts.iucr.org/mailman/listinfo/ddlm-group -- ===================================================== Herbert J. Bernstein, Professor of Computer Science Dowling College, Kramer Science Center, KSC 121 Idle Hour Blvd, Oakdale, NY, 11769 +1-631-244-3035 yaya@dowling.edu ===================================================== _______________________________________________ ddlm-group mailing list ddlm-group@iucr.org http://scripts.iucr.org/mailman/listinfo/ddlm-group
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