Please find below my suggestions for change in chap. 17, which are mainly grammatical. They may be completely off the mark, in which case I defer to your greater learning.

If I may soapbox about certainty and uncertainty:

(1) I see merit in assigning certainties by category: (a) C (confidence) >= 95% (i.e. beyond reasonable doubt); (b) 50% <= C < 95% (i.e. probably as given); (c) C < 50% (i.e. probably not as given). This scheme is somewhat similar to the one used by palaeographers to grade certainty of letters: namely, (a) beyond doubt, (b) doubtful (indicated by a letter with a sublinear dot), and (c) illegible (a bare sublinear dot). Such a scheme works well for humans, reducing the burden of estimating probabilities such as those found in 17.1.2. A small number of well-defined categories would, I believe, help editors to be more precise about what they mean. This sounds paradoxical (less latitude = more precision); however, whereas a group of editors would give a range of numbers for some certainty, they may well agree on which category best describes it. In short, my plea is that a grade is better than a number when it comes to certs assigned by people. (Assignment by machines is a different matter.) Perhaps such a scheme could be encouraged in future editions of the TEI?

(2) Uncertainty is ubiquitous. Why not make cert a universal attribute?

SUGGESTED CHANGES:

17 Certainty and Responsibility, para 3:

Change
"To use the note and respStmt elements, no special steps are needed, since they are defined in the core tag set and header respectively."
to
"No special steps are needed to use the note and respStmt elements since they are defined in the core tag set and header, respectively."

17.1, para 3:

Change
"though they may be expressed using note."
to
"though they may be expressed using the note element."

17.1.1, second example <note>:

Rearrange so there is no hyphen in target="p1 p2"? (Hyphens appear in the other examples as well.)

17.1.2, assertedValue:

"if none is given, it applies to the markup in the text" is ambiguous with respect to the precedents.

para 3:

Maybe precede "The certainty element may be used to record doubts" with "Returning to the example,"

Change
"(here: whether we have used the correct element type):"
to
"(here, whether we have used the correct element type):"

First example:

Change
"<!- ... elsewhere in the document ... ->"
to
"<!-- ... elsewhere in the document ... -->"

(Similar "-" for "--" errors need to be corrected in the other examples as well.)

p. 409, para 2:

Change
"Both elements indicate the same location in the text, but the second provides an alternative choice of generic identifier (here: persName) is given as the value of the assertedValue attribute:"
to
"Both elements indicate the same location in the text, but the second provides an alternative choice of generic identifier (here, persName) which is given as the value of the assertedValue attribute:"

(The font size of persName needs to be changed.)

p. 410:

Check font size of #transcribedContent and #suppliedContent.

para 6:

Change
"(specifically, when the alternate reading has no elements nested within it)"
to
"(specifically, when the alternative reading has no elements nested within it)".

Last para:

Are commas required in "discursive unstructured indication" and "complex structured project-specific expressions"?

p. 411, para 2:

Change
"While they may take any string of characters as value,"
to
"While each may take any string of characters as its value,"

Change
"encoders are should provide their own controlled vocabulary"
to
"encoders should provide their own controlled vocabulary"

17.2, para 2:

Change
"In some cases, however, more detailed element-by-element information may be desired, in order to distinguish, for example, between the individuals responsible for transcribing the content and those responsible for determining that a given word or phrase constitutes a proper noun."
to
"In some cases, however, more detailed element-by-element information may be desired. For example, one may wish to distinguish between the individuals responsible for transcribing the content and those responsible for determining that a given word or phrase constitutes a proper noun."

Description of <respons>:

Change
"markup of some particular element(s)"
to
"markup of particular element(s)"

target:

Delete "SGML"?

para 3:

Change
"as they do on the certainty element"
to
"as they do in the certainty element"

Delete the comma following "encoding of those elements"

"combined as appropriate:" change the colon to a semicolon

p. 412, para 2:

Change
"Some elements bear specialized resp or agent attributes, which have specific meaning which varies from element to element;"
to
"Some elements bear specialized resp or agent attributes which have specific meanings that vary from element to element;"

