More accurate description for non-linking elements becoming links

[jelovirt]

In 2.0 draft spec, https://github.com/oasis-tcs/dita/blob/DITA-2.0/specification/archSpec/base/processing-keyref-for-links.dita#L9 says

When a key definition is bound to a resource that is addressed by the @href or @keyref attributes, and does not specify "none" for the @linking attribute, all references to that key definition become links to the bound resource.

This means if I have <keyword keyref="target"/> this will become a links, even though <keyword> normally is not a link element. Could the spec language be improved to be more accurate what "become a link" means.

Does that mean they become xref-like hyperlinks, or is what link means for these cases implementation dependent?

For example, if you have <keydef keys="target" href="image.png" format="png"/>, should <keyword keyref="target"/> become an xref-like hyperlink to the image, or can it become image-like embedded "link".

[robander]

Paraphrasing discussion at today's TC meeting -- we think that it becomes a link (equivalent to xref-like hyperlink), but we should add a clarification to the spec that notes that how that link is rendered is implementation dependent. That is, if you end up with something like <keyword href="image.png">, an implementation could either render that as a download link with some link text, or it could try and render it as an inline image.

We will update the spec with some new wording around this.