Ok, I am not the expert on that but have a look on: http://cocoon.apache.org/2.1/apidocs/org/apache/cocoon/components/modules/input/package-summary.html
http://svn.apache.org/viewcvs.cgi/cocoon/trunk/src/java/org/apache/cocoon/components/modules/input/SimpleMappingMetaModule.java?view=markup
If you want to modify the default behavior just patch this class. It seems to me (I just had a *quick* look) that it is possible. ;-)
How would we do it so that it did not break backward compatibility? That is how does the class know when we are referring to a node name and when we are referring to an ID?
Ross
