[osis-core] <lb> element

[Chris Little]

Todd,

My problem is really just with having two separate means for expressing 
the same thing without anything forcing us to do so.

>What would a "line break" mean if it were not in a "line" (<l> element)?
>
>Isn't a line break outside of a line no longer a line break?
>
>Is the following the kind of thing you are envisioning?
><p>text text text text text text text text text text text text <lb/>
>text text text text text text text text text text text text</p>
>(wouldn't this be a "paragraph break")
>
We already have <milestone type="line"/> existing outside of <l>, but it 
has exactly the same semantics as <lb/> within <l>, so I presume a 
purpose does exist (for the milestone version).  I cannot, myself, think 
of any good uses for <milestone type="line"/> aside from marking 
orthographic lines in facsimiles of manuscripts/inscriptions, but we had 
also decided that <l> would handle orthographic line breaks.

>My thinking (and the logic that lead to adding the <lb/> element) was
>that because recording a break within a line of poetry is common that it
>made sense to add a simple, short, special purpose element, rather than
>using the <milestone> element that was already available.  
>
>For the other less common cases that occur outside of <l> the use of
><milestone> would be more consistent because there will be a number of
>types of breaks that are not "line breaks" (page breaks, places where a
>picture or study resource could be added, etc...).  By giving "line
>break" special treatment outside of <l> would lead to inconsistent
>marking of breaks in general.
>
I don't think marking linebreaks (in addition to the lines themselves) 
in poetry is a common occurrence at all.  I've never seen it outside of 
the CEV, and I think that occurrence is arguably bad practice, though 
it's not our place to fix the translators' mistakes.

That said, I really don't have a problem with using <lb/> both inside & 
outside of <l>.  Nor would I have a problem with the addition of a <pb/> 
element as Patrick suggested at the meeting.  Inconsistent manners of 
expressing similar semantics is better than inconsistent manners of 
expressing identical semantics, in my opinion, if we want to leave all 
other milestones as <milestone> elements.

--Chris