Target references "added" text (add \xta ...\xta*)

[klassenjm]

Proposal

• Add character marker pair \xta …\xta* for “target reference(s) added / extra text”.
• Recommend that \xt is only used to mark the target reference elements (rather than nesting \+xta …\+xta* inside of \xt which could be very problematic when trying to find and parse actual references)

A companion USX 3.0 proposal exists at: ubsicap/usx#8

Details

Being able to accurately parse and validate references strings is important. It becomes increasingly so when parsing references to generate machine readable forms (e.g. in USX / XML conversions). An additional marker is needed to mark text which should be ignored

In ParaTExt, the Scripture Reference Settings can be configured to ignore certain strings found in reference elements such as \xt or \r elements when checking references. However, in some texts the marked content may not be consistent and therefore cannot be easily added to the Scripture Reference Settings ignore list. Additionally, not all USFM text will be handled by ParaTExt and in these contexts an explicit marker would be useful.

Examples

\x - \xo 3.0 \xta Compare with \xt Mk 1.1-8; Lk 3.1-18; \xta and 
\xt Jn 1.19-28 \xta parallels.\x*

Application Support Requirements

In cross reference export / import tools, need to consider how to handle cross references with \xta ...\xta* markup. The content of \xta ...\xta cannot be automatically adapted when importing to another project.