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Re: [ddlm-group] Updated draft from subgroup discussing encodings. .


On Saturday, October 09, 2010 6:24 AM, Herbert J. Bernstein wrote:

>The change in the handling of an underscore in a tag name (requiring at least one more character) is a good idea in any case (whether or not the use for cancatenation is adopted).  I suggest we put that change to a vote promptly and separately.

[...]

>On Sat, 9 Oct 2010, SIMON WESTRIP wrote:

[...]

>> On a related point, the draft spec states:
>>
>> "A data name begins with an ASCII _ and may be followed by any number
>> of characters within the 2048 character restriction."
>>
>> I think this should read:
>>
>> "A data name begins with an ASCII _  and is followed by one or more
>> characters within the 2048 character restriction."
>>
>> Or words to that effect - especially if the underscore is adopted as
>> an operator.

I don't think that's a change relative to CIF 1.  The formal grammar gives this production for <Tag>:
        '_'{ <NonBlankChar>}+

Thus, either a lone underscore is not a valid tag / data name in CIF1, or the formal grammar must be held to be in error.  I have always taken the formal grammar to be definitive in cases such as this one -- that's its purpose, after all.

If a vote is called on this topic then I will vote in favor.  I think it could also be handled simply as an editorial correction, however.


Regards,

John
--
John C. Bollinger, Ph.D.
Department of Structural Biology
St. Jude Children's Research Hospital


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