Hi -
Perhaps it would be useful to consider
http://www.ietf.org/IESG/STATEMENTS/pseudo-code-in-specs.txt
Randy
From: "Peter Constable" <petercon(_at_)microsoft(_dot_)com>
To: <ietf(_at_)ietf(_dot_)org>
Sent: Tuesday, December 14, 2004 2:16 PM
Subject: Re: New Last Call: 'Tags for Identifying Languages' to BCP
....
This is somewhat moot since the author has indicated the relevant
portion of the ABNF will be revised. In this case, though, the ABNF
could not be said to be in contradiction with the English prose:
anything permitted by the constraints specified in the English prose
would be recognized using the ABNF.
It is true that there are strings that could be recognized by the ABNF
that would not be permitted by the English prose, but the revision being
made to make the ABNF production in question match what Bruce Lilley
thought it should be does not change that. The only way to write the
ABNF in a way that it permits exactly no more or no less than what is
specified by the English prose would be to have the production rule
simply enumerate a specific set of terminal strings, which does not seem
to be particularly helpful, especially when the the RFC would establish
a machine-readable registry maintained by IANA in which those very
strings are enumerated.
...
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