Quoting Mike Taylor <[log in to unmask]>:

>
> > 
> > I don't sematically see "same element" (in the same leaf container)
> > as proximity.
> 
> Hmm.  I am trying to think of a polite way to say "then you are
> mistaken", but I can't find one.  :-)

We are not here to be polite but to create good systems.. 

> > Proximity is distance.. Within X characters.. Within X
> > words.. within some metric. Same element is NOT a metric.
> 
> If you really want to push this point, you'll have to overturn an
> ANSI/NISO standard going back a full decade and ratified by ISO.  See
> 	http://www.loc.gov/z3950/agency/markup/09.html#3.7.2
>

I am, as you know, quite familar with it. It was in many ways wrong but
reflected models of throught widespread back decades ago when we had enough
of a time doing proximity with characters and words and most of us had
little to no support of paragraph, section chapter. It might have seemed
to make sense to go from "chapter" to an abstract "element" but it does
not. Byte streams, characters, words, lines etc. have a concept of unit,
distance and order.

To be a proximity there is (and specified here too) a scalar (distance)
and a relation.

In a structured document such as

<person>
  <name> Edward Zimermann  </name>
  <address>   </address>
  <network>
    <email> [log in to unmask]</email>
  </network>
</company>
<company>
  <primary>
    <name> Nonmonotic labs </name>
   .