xml-dev - Re: Access Languages are Tied to Schemas

[Joe Lapp <jlapp@acm.org>]

"Mark L. Fussell" <fussellm@alumni.caltech.edu> wrote:
>[...] Object models describe the possible objects 
>and structures that can exist in a system.  [...]
>DTDs can describe some of this modeling information, but not particularly 
>well and really only for a limited set of object models.

I do think that "object model" is too broad a term for what an SGML/XML
repository can accomplish.  I think the SGML/XML repository offers a new
way of looking at objects.  Clients may process SGML/XML constructs as
raw document information, or clients may process the constructs by
interpreting them (adding semantic value not provided by the repository).
I'm guessing that most clients that go about interpreting repository
data will create objects that contain those data, and those objects will
have behavior.  We have a single object's data living as sibling objects
on many client machines.  I'm guessing that these objects (instantiated
on client machines) will all have behavior and any other property we
ascribe to objects of an object model.  The object model of an SGML/XML
repository is schizophrenic.

When we evaluate the capabilities of SGML/XML to support object models,
I think we need to take client behavior into account.  The repository is
acting more like a file system for the state information of objects, and
the clients are more like applications that use the file system.

This seems like a different model for designing systems, and I wonder
how far we can take it.
--
Joe Lapp (Java Apps Developer/Consultant)
Unite for Java! - http://www.javalobby.org
jlapp@acm.org

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