[MacPerl-Porters] Need authoritative Apple refs for EOL == CR

[Arved Sandstrom <Arved_37@chebucto.ns.ca>]

I could use some help on this, big time. This has come up before, and
probably will again.

Enno Derksen, who authors XML::XQL, started this \n and \xA business off
again on the Perl-XML list a few days ago. I planted the seed in his mind
a few months back and I don't think he's let go of it. :-)

The consensus now appears to be this: XML does NOT require \n == \xA
internally, but according to the spec an XML processor _must_ pass \xA out
to an application, in place of \xD\xA or \xA. Despite the fact this is not
so attractive for us on the MacOS side, I have to reluctantly concur with
this interpretation, after really carefully re-reading the EOL handling
section in the XML spec. (It sort of helps that Larry Wall pointed this
out in the first place... :-))

Note that this also means that a lot of XML module tests aren't properly
written, as they are Unix-centric. So this is not an interpretation that
currently has  Perl XML extension authors overjoyed either. (The reason
the tests are flawed is because they are comparing original content
directly to returned XML - this works on Unix only).

So far the discussion has been quite reasonable (Larry appears to be
supportive, in particular), but just today Tim Bray, who is directly
responsible for this chunk of the spec, also joined in. He clearly is not
aware that \n != \xA on MacOS, and I need a good, solid authoritative ref
from Apple docs (more than one is even better) saying that the line
terminator for Mac apps is a CR (\xD), which I can refer him to. I've
looked at IM:Text, IM:Printing, IM:Files, searched on the Apple Developers
site, and I can't find a thing, except one ancient Tech Note pertaining to
A/UX <=> HFS file translations. So, help! :-)

The reason I'm fired up is that the argument has moved away from what Perl
XML modules should be doing to an examination of whether the XML spec is
correct or reasonable with respect to EOL's, there appears to be at least
some willingness to accept that the XML spec could be modified in this
regard (if not active proponency), and if I can insert some factual basis
for asserting that \n == CR on MacOS into the debate, there may be some
hope for getting an actual mod to the XML spec itself. I'm not holding my
breath, but I'd like to try.

Thanks for any help. Arved

P.S. I don't know about anybody else, but I have to sort of wonder what
Apple is up to. Here's something as important as the XML spec, and one of
the lead people working on it (Tim Bray), with specific responsibilities
pertaining to the EOL issue, hasn't even been apprised that things are a
little bit different over on Macs. Maybe Apple is thinking that it'll
become a non-issue with MacOS X: I certainly hope that's not it, though.



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