Issue - 103 - Making getVariableData portable

["Yaron Y. Goland" <ygoland@bea.com>]

The BPEL specification contains an ambiguity in how XPaths are processed 
in regards to WSDL messages. For example, the outcome of 
getVariableData("Foo","P1","..") is currently indeterminate.

Because of the ambiguity in the spec, 7 of XPath's 13 axis are undefined 
in getVariableData for WSDL messages - ancestor, ancestor-or-self, 
following, following-sibling, parent, preceding, preceding-sibling.

To provide for portability we need to define a model for how WSDL 
messageTypes are manifested in XPath such that the outcome of using the 
previous 7 axis's is well defined.

To date two proposals have been made for how to achieve this consistency:

1) Whole Message Modeling - The whole message can be modeled as a single 
infoset.

2) Independent Part Modeling - Each part can be defined as a stand alone 
infoset.

I can happily live with either approach although I prefer the first one.

What approach would other group members like to take?

	Thanks,

		Yaron