compound datatype inheritance

The editors,

The 2004-12-16 draft of the XSL 1.1 Recommendation discusses compound
property inheritance as follows.

<quote>
Short forms may be used together with complete forms; the complete forms
have precedence over the expansion of a short form. For example:

space-before="4.0pt"
space-before.maximum="6.0pt"

is equivalent to a specification of

space-before.minimum="4.0pt"
space-before.optimum="4.0pt"
space-before.maximum="6.0pt"
space-before.precedence="0"
space-before.conditionality="discard"

Compound values of properties are inherited as a unit and not as
individual components. After inheritance any complete form specification
for a component is used to set its value.
</quote>

In the example given above, will a child of an
element on which
    space-before="4.0pt"
    space-before.maximum="6.0pt"
are defined inherit
1)   space-before.maximum="6.0pt"
or
2)   space-before.maximum="4.0pt"
?

My confusion arises from uncertainty as to what the phrase "as a unit"
means.  I assume that the result is 1), and that "as a unit" implies
that, even though only "space-before" is defined as inheriting, the
current state of the space-before "object" is what is inherited.

If that is so, is there any functional difference in treating short-form
compound properties as shorthands _with inheritance capability_, and
treating the specific forms of an inheritable compound as themselves
inheritable?

Yours faithfully,
-- 
Peter B. West <http://cv.pbw.id.au/>
Folio <http://defoe.sourceforge.net/folio/> <http://folio.bkbits.net/>