TMCL requirements; Was: [sc34wg3] a new name for the RM

[Martin Bryan]

In response to

> >* Michel Biezunski
> >|
> >| Remember the standard is not only aimed at implementers, it's also
> >| for information users.
>
Mary wrote:

> I really disagree with this statement. These standards are not for
> information users. We do need documents for them too, but the RM, SAM,
> TMCL, TMQL are not for them. We do need a good tutorial-like introduction
> though and something equivalent to Tom Bray's annotation of the XML
> standard (note: this was not part of the standard, but possibly read by
> 1000X more people than the original standard itself) The standard was read
> by the parser writers (I hope :))

The point that Michel was making is that TMCL statements, whatever form they
might take, need to be human parsable so that users can validate whether or
not the constraints have been met. If the language is so convoluted that
only a program can implement it then it will be a complete failure. Unless
the end-users understand what they are doing, and why, writing any formal
descripition of the language is irrelevant. Whether the tutorial forms an
introduction to the standard, and informative annex or a separate TR is
irrelevant. What is vital is that the human understandable version is
available for review at the same time as the formal material so that we can
get adequate feedback from the user community as well as the few developers
able to understand any formal definitions.

Martin Bryan