Referencing of elements

The IDM schema establishes relationships between elements and defines information at a central point which are used on multiple occasions in another position. The reuse of the information and the structure of element relationships takes place via referencing. The type of referencing used in the IDM schema is described in the following.

Definition of terms

The IDM schema uses the following terms for the referencing of elements:

Key element	An XML element referenced by other elements.
Ref element	An XML element referencing other elements

Referencing procedure

The key element has attributes that allow for its unequivocal identification. The ref element has at least the key attributes of the key element. The reference in which the attribute values of the ref element are identical to those of the key element is established between the elements.

Example: Referencing the rule across multiple series, from the series, the product group and the item

The following example shows how a rule (DECISION) is referenced from an item (ITEM). Only some of the XML elements are explained.

Key element

T_NEW_CATALOG/FEATURE_DEFINITION/DECISIONS

 

<DECISIONS>

 <DECISION DECISION_NO="1"/> … </DECISION>

  <DECISION DECISION_NO="2"/> … </DECISION>

  <DECISION DECISION_NO="3"/> … </DECISION>

  . . .

 </DECISIONS>

 

Ref element

T_NEW_CATALOG/SERIES/SERIE/PRODUCT_GROUPS/PRODUCT_GROUP/ITEMS/ITEM

 

<ITEMS>

 <ITEM TYPE_NO="1111">

    <DECISIONS>

     <DECISION_REF DECISION_NO="1"> …</DECISION_REF>

     . . .

</ITEMS>

 

Example: referencing of an option

The following example shows how to reference an option from an assessment procedure.

Key element

T_NEW_CATALOG/FEATURE_DEFINITION/FEATURES/FEATURE/OPTIONS/OPTION

<FEATURES>

 <FEATURE FEATURE_NO="15"> <!-- foot height-->

   <OPTIONS>

     <OPTION OPTION_KEY="100"> …</OPTION>

     <OPTION OPTION_KEY="120"> …</OPTION>

     <OPTION OPTION_KEY="30"> …</OPTION>

   </OPTIONS>

 </FEATURE>

 <FEATURE FEATURE_NO="17"> <!-- Footshape-->

   <OPTIONS>

     <OPTION OPTION_KEY="F00"> …</OPTION>

     <OPTION OPTION_KEY="F3Z"> …</OPTION>

     <OPTIONOPTION_KEY="F70"> …</OPTION>

   </OPTIONS>

 </FEATURE>

</FEATURES>

For feature 15, the XML elements define three options (OPTION) with codes 100,120,30. For feature 17, three options with codes F00, F3Z, F70 are defined. An option is identified via the combination of FEATURE_NO and OPTION_KEY.