Use complex types in imported XSD from importing XSD without changing existing XMLs-CodePudding

Question: Is it possible to import complexTypes into a schema without having to declare both namespaces in the resulting XML file?

I know that similar questions have been asked, but none I've seen have covered my specific need which takes a bit to explain:

Let's say in a prior version of a piece of software we shipped a schema that would look like this example:

specific.xsd

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<xs:schema xmlns:xs="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" targetNamespace="http://test.com/specific" xmlns="http://test.com/specific" elementFormDefault="qualified" version="1.0">
    <xs:complexType name="testType">
        <xs:sequence>
            <xs:element name="testSubElement" type="testSubElement"></xs:element>
        </xs:sequence>
    </xs:complexType>

    <xs:complexType name="testSubElement"></xs:complexType>

    <element name="testType" type="common:testType"></element>
</xs:schema>

to be used like this:

file.xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<testType xmlns="http://test.com/specific" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
    xsi:schemaLocation="http://test.com/specific specific.xsd">
    <testSubElement/>
</testType>

We actually had several similar schemas, so later we decided to pull out the common definitions into a core file and import that file into the relevant schemas:

common.xsd:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<xs:schema xmlns:xs="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" targetNamespace="http://test.com/common" xmlns="http://test.com/common" elementFormDefault="qualified" version="1.0">
    <xs:complexType name="testType">
        <xs:sequence>
            <xs:element name="testSubElement" type="testSubElement"></xs:element>
        </xs:sequence>
    </xs:complexType>

    <xs:complexType name="testSubElement"></xs:complexType>
</xs:schema>

specific.xsd:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<schema xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" targetNamespace="http://test.com/specific" 
    elementFormDefault="qualified" xmlns:specific="http://test.com/specific" xmlns:common="http://test.com/common" version="1.0">
    
    <import namespace="http://test.com/common" schemaLocation="common.xsd"/>

    <element name="testType" type="common:testType"></element>
</schema>

However, now we're getting issues with existing files not validating correctly like they used to:

$ xmllint --schema specific.xsd myFile.xml
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<testType xmlns="http://test.com/specific" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xsi:schemaLocation="http://test.com/specific specific.xsd">
    <testSubElement/>
</testType>
myFile.xml:4: element testSubElement: Schemas validity error : Element '{http://test.com/specific}testSubElement': This element is not expected. Expected is ( {http://test.com/common}testSubElement ).
myFile.xml fails to validate

Is it possible for us to modify our schema into this common/specific pattern without needing to make changes to the XML files conforming to the schema, while preserving the validation? How would it be done?

CodePudding user response：

If you want to use the same namespace for elements defined in both schema documents, then both schema documents should have the same target namespace and you should use xs:include rather than xs:import to combine them.