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From: jwh@boston.ifs.umich.edu (Jim Howe)
Newsgroups: comp.text.sgml
Subject: Re: Is there a DTD standard?
Message-ID: <1990Sep12.135024.2644@terminator.cc.umich.edu>
Date: 12 Sep 90 13:50:24 GMT
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In article <1990Sep12.020242.2916@cs.rochester.edu>,
crowl@cs.rochester.edu (Lawrence Crowl) writes:

|> The idea of SGML as a meta-language for defining document syntax is a good
|> idea.  However, most of the time, I'm just writing text.  Does there exist a
|> standard for a DTD that says what tags to use in book/articles?  For
instance, 
|> should I use <paragraph> or <par> or what?  How should I describe bulleted
|> lists?
|> 

There do exist some standard DTD's.  The one I am most familiar with is the AAP
(Association of American Publishers) DTD's.  They have defined DTD's that are
used for books and magazine articles.  These DTD's have been adopted by ANSI
as ANSI/NISO Z39.59-1988.  There is another standard in the works for the CALS
project.  It is known as Mil-28001 and is quite complex.
  
|> 
|> But typesetting the document requires that one know what <chapter> and
|> <paragraph> mean.  The SGML standard doesn't say what they mean. 
Does anyone
|> know of work in this area?  Surely the book and journal publishers have an
|> opinion on what should be done.

The typeset definition of <chapter>, <paragraph>, etc. is purely up to
the discretion
of the publisher (with possible input from the author).  Different
publishers may
choose to format the document differently.  Also, the definition of tags
will vary
depending on the publication medium.  The same document may be both
published on
paper as well as on CD-ROM, for example.  There is work being done to
define a formatting
standard as well as a markup standard but that work is currently incomplete.

|> -- 
|>   Lawrence Crowl		716-275-9499	University of Rochester
|> 		      crowl@cs.rochester.edu	Computer Science Department
|> 	  ...!{ames,rutgers}!rochester!crowl	Rochester, New York,  14627


James W. Howe			   internet: jwh@ifs.umich.edu
University of Michigan             uucp:     uunet!mailrus!ifs.umich.edu!jwh
Ann Arbor, MI   48103-4943