Syntactic problems with the pound/number symbol

[QDP2012]

Good afternoon RR DBAs,

Issue

Syntactic problems caused by use of number/pound-symbol in DB system names​

Introduction

• With regard to syntatic problems in the DB and Wiki, thankfully use of the ampersand (&) symbol already has been disallowed in the DB (per DBA HB v1.8 sec 6.1.3), and is almost eliminated from the Wiki's article-titles, etc. For a variety of obvious reasons, ampersand-use creates problems.
  
  
• Another syntatic problem which might not be as obvious (because it does not happen as often), is the use of the pound/number (#) symbol in system-names.

Situation

• In the RR DBA Handbook v1.8, section 6.3.3 - System Names, pg 18, paragraphs 3 and 4, it suggests that the number/pound (#) symbol can be used when arbitrarily naming systems with a numeric value appended to the system-name.
  
  

  System names shall always be unique. It is common to have a number of trunked systems operated by a single business so for these systems the name shall include unique identifying information in parentheses at the end of the name. Use the minimum amount of information to uniquely identify the system (e.g., geographic location, frequency band, type of system, etc.). When these options are exhausted systems may be arbitrarily numbered sequentially beginning with 1.
  
  Here are some example system names:
  

  • ABC Communications (Houston 460 MHz LTR)
  • ABC Communications (Houston 850 MHz LTR)
  • ABC Communications (Houston Motorola)
  • XYZ Communications (Austin #1)
  • XYZ Communications (Austin #2)

Problem

• While the above policy's numeric naming-scheme makes sense, the pound/number symbol itself becomes a problem when navigating from the DB to the Wiki, because the pound symbol is automatically included in the URL associated with the "Wiki" button on the system's DB page.
  
  
• When the URL that is associated with the DB page's "Wiki" button is parsed, the pound-symbol is not treated as simply another character in the Wiki-article title, but is treated as an HTML reserved-character which forces everything following it to be truncated from the title and used as an HTML "NAME" value (most commonly used to jump down/directly to a specific section of a long page).

Real Example from DB and Wiki

Please consider these two systems:

• System #1 DB link: Unidentified LTR (George Town #1)
  
  System #1 "Wiki button" link: Unidentified LTR (George Town #1)
  
  System #1:"Wiki button" link is PARSED as Unidentified LTR (George Town
  
  System #1 direct Wiki link: Unidentified LTR (George Town 1)
  
  
• Wiki-Redirect that is required for navigating from the DB to System #1's Wiki page: Unidentified LTR (George Town
  
  
  
• System #2 DB link: Unidentified LTR (George Town #2)
  
  System #2 "Wiki button" link: Unidentified LTR (George Town #2)
  
  System #2:"Wiki button" link is PARSED as Unidentified LTR (George Town
  
  System #2 direct Wiki link: Unidentified LTR (George Town 2) (page is not yet created, but is the correct target)
  
  
  
• Please note that the "Wiki-buttons" on each of the above DB pages are parsed exactly the same.
  
  This causes the System #2 "Wiki button" to navigate to the same Wiki-Redirect used for System #1 above. This means that when System #2's Wiki page is created, there will be no way to navigate from the System #2 DB page directly to the System #2 Wiki page, (with or without the use of a redirect).
  

In summary, please notice the two separate problems caused by the number/pound symbol in the above example

• Problem 1: On System #1's DB page, the "Wiki-Button" fails to directly navigate to the correct Wiki page. A redirect was implemented as a stop-gap solution for that page.
  
  
• Problem 2: On System #2's DB page, the "Wiki-Button" will never navigate to the correct Wiki page, because it gets diverted by the Wiki-redirect used for System #1.
  
  
• This all happens because the pound/number symbol in HTML is a reserved-character which indicates/precedes an HTML NAME value.

Request for Consideration

• Please consider renaming the above systems in the RRDB, so that the associated Wiki buttons no longer include a pound/number symbol.
  
  
• Please consider updating the DBA Handbook to disallow use of the pound/number symbol in system-names, since system-names usually become Wiki-page names.

If I am misunderstanding the situation, and/or how it should be addressed, please advise accordingly.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Respectfully,

 

[QDP2012]

Thank you, sir.

Good evening ericcarlson,

Thank you, sir, for the quick response and update to the above mentioned system-names in the DB

The related Wiki pages also have been updated accordingly. Navigation is normal now.

Thanks again,