[DFDL-WG] example/use-case wanted - separatorSuppressionPolicy 'trailingEmptyStrict' and 'never'

[Mike Beckerle]

I see that X12 is the USA-used EDI message standard - analogous to the
UN/EDIFACT used outside USA.
I'll pass along that this was motivated by X12, though to my knowledge
there is no DFDL schema generally available for any part of X12.

I think for SSP 'never' I can gen-up an example pretty easily.

Given what I've got below, can you think of where such formats would appear
in anything real-world?

The only thing I can think of is somebody taking a COBOL structure with two
"occurs N times depending on ..." arrays in it, and modernizing the format
into something variable-length with separators for use in a more modern
application.

My example for separatorSuppressionPolicy='never' is below.

Assuming dfdl:occursCountKind='implicit' everywhere

<sequence dfdl:separator="," dfdl:separatorSuppressionPolicy="never">
  <element name="givenName" type="xs:string" minOccurs="0" maxOccurs="3"/>
  <element name="surname" type="xs:string" minOccurs="0"/>
  <element name="ph" type="xs:string" minOccurs="0" maxOccurs="6"/>
</sequence>

This format means there are always 10 locations separated by 9 commas.

Whether something is a givenName, surname, or phone number is just
determined positionally by counting the separators as the parse passes
them.

Well-formed instance:

"michael, james,,rogers,888-888-8888,777-777-7777,,,,"

XML flavored DFDL infoset:

<givenName>michael</givenName>
<givenName>james</givenName>
<surname>rogers</surname>
<ph>888-888-8888</ph>
<ph>777-777-7777</ph>

Well-formed instance:

"madonna,,,,,,,,,"

XML flavored equivalent infoset:

<givenName>madonna</givenName>

Both the above examples would unparse to exactly the input data.

Mike Beckerle | OGF DFDL Workgroup Co-Chair | Owl Cyber Defense |
www.owlcyberdefense.com
Please note: Contributions to the DFDL Workgroup's email discussions are
subject to the OGF Intellectual Property Policy
<http://www.ogf.org/About/abt_policies.php>



On Tue, Apr 20, 2021 at 1:08 PM Steve Hanson <smh at uk.ibm.com> wrote:

> 'trailingEmptyStrict' was for X12 if I recall. It is not valid to have
> trailing separators.
> 'never' I don't have an example for.
>
> Regards
>
> Steve Hanson
>
> IBM Hybrid Integration, Hursley, UK
> Architect, *IBM DFDL*
> <http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/library/se-dfdl/index.html>
> Co-Chair, *OGF DFDL Working Group* <http://www.ogf.org/dfdl/>
> *smh at uk.ibm.com* <smh at uk.ibm.com>
> tel:+44-1962-815848
> mob:+44-7717-378890
> Note: I work Tuesday to Friday
>
>
>
> From:        Mike Beckerle <mbeckerle.dfdl at gmail.com>
> To:        DFDL-WG <dfdl-wg at ogf.org>
> Date:        20/04/2021 15:12
> Subject:        [EXTERNAL] [DFDL-WG] example/use-case wanted -
> separatorSuppressionPolicy 'trailingEmptyStrict' and 'never'
> Sent by:        "dfdl-wg" <dfdl-wg-bounces at ogf.org>
> ------------------------------
>
>
>
> Users of Apache Daffodil have asked what these property values are for,
> i.e., what are idiomatic uses of this property for actual formats, or in
> other words, what kind of data are these properties needed for?
>
> I'd like to provide them examples of this if anyone can recall the kinds
> of specific use cases for these property values.
>
> I've been searching through the example DFDL schemas I can find, and none
> use trailingEmptyStrict or never for this property.
>
> Mike Beckerle | OGF DFDL Workgroup Co-Chair | Owl Cyber Defense |
> *www.owlcyberdefense.com* <http://www.owlcyberdefense.com>
> Please note: Contributions to the DFDL Workgroup's email discussions are
> subject to the *OGF Intellectual Property Policy*
> <http://www.ogf.org/About/abt_policies.php>
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