xml-dev - Re: Colonialism, SAX, Java, and Namespaces

[Paul Prescod <paul@prescod.net>]

Tyler Baker wrote:
> 
> I have seen one XSL Stylesheet example posted by a newbie that dealt 
> with namespaces.  The fact that no one is using this supplement to XML 
> called "Namespaces in XML" can be construed that namespaces are either 
> too complicated or too usesless to be of any utility to these
> "average developers".

Some specifications are meant to be directly used by end-users: CSS.
Some specifications are meant to be used by other standardizers: DTDs.

Namespaces are being used in RDF, XSL, and Voyager. "Average developers"
will use namespaces through those technologies and others.

I do not buy your thesis that the fact that people are not yet using
namespaces demonstrates that namespaces are a failure. XSL and Voyager are
not standardized yet and RDF is itself quite immature in its
implementations.

I also do not buy the thesis that it elitist to recommend that "average
developers" not waste their time learning an abstraction until
infrastructure and context becomes available in order to use it. There are
many technologies that I expect will be relevant to average developers at
some point in the future but are not now.
-- 
 Paul Prescod  - ISOGEN Consulting Engineer speaking for only himself
 http://itrc.uwaterloo.ca/~papresco

"Remember, Ginger Rogers did everything that Fred Astaire did,
but she did it backwards and in high heels."
                                               --Faith Whittlesey

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