XMI12 — Include Derived Attributes and References of Derived Associations

Topic: Include Derived Attributes and References of Derived Associations in
the XML DTD Production

XMI 1.1 is not clear nor consistent with respect to inclusion of derived
attributes and references of derived associations in the XML DTD
production. As a result, some XMI RTF member believes they should be
included, while some other member believes they should not be included.

To be consistent with MOF, MOF to IDL Mapping, and JMI (Java Metadata API,
a standard being developed under the Java Community Process), XMI should
include derived attributes and references of derived associations in the
XML DTD production.

If not, XMI will limit its usefulness in addition to being inconsistent
with MOF, MOF to IDL Mapping, and JMI. For example, suppose age is a
derived attribute of class Person in some MOF-compliant metamodel. MOF to
IDL Mapping allows one to access or interchange age in IDL or any
programming language that has an IDL mapping. JMI allows one to access or
interchange age in Java. If XMI does not allow one to access or interchange
age in XML, then one would have to use something like XML Binding to Java
in conjunction with JMI to do so. The same goes for references of derived
associations.

Therefore, if XMI does not allow inclusion of derived attributes and
references of derived associations in the XML DTD production, one would
have to use XMI to access or interchange most metadata information in XML
and use something like XML Binding to Java with JMI to access or
interchange derived metadata information in XML. This is simply
unreasonable.