Term Ref

A Term Ref is a word or phrase that is marked up (in a specific way) so that it refers to a particular concept (or other semantic unit), enabling it to be rendered in a variety of ways for the purpose of helping readers to (better) understand the intention of its author.

A TermRef consists of two parts. The first part is the word or phrase that is marked up (the so-called show text). The second part is the actual reference that specifies the concept (or other semantic unit) to which the TermRef refers. This second part is called a term identifier.

Authors need to know the [TermRef syntax](/docs/specs/syntax/term-refs) that they are expected to use.Curators, which are expected to control the ways in which authored texts are further processed (into rendered texts), will need to know the options provided by the TRRT tool in order to ensure that the TermRefs that are used in in authored text are rendered in the way(s) that are envisaged.

Purpose

TermRefs make it easy for authors to associate some word(s) or phrase(s) with a specific semantic unit, c.q. the curated text that (authoritatively) documents it. Also, TermRefs enable authored texts to be rendered in various ways, each of which is capable of converting such TermRefs into effects that help readers to (better) understand what the author(s) of the text intended when using a term or phrase.

Example Characteristic

TermRefs can be used to refer to particular characteristics associated with the semantic unit to which they refer. This section exists as an illustration that it can be referenced by the TermRef [Example characteristic of TermRefs](term-ref#example)