xml-dev - Re: Lotsa laughs

[John Cowan <cowan@locke.ccil.org>]

Lisa Rein wrote:

> As far as your references to specifics on the BizTalk site go, I am
> still unable to get to those files without using IE5 - which I will get
> to eventually I suppose when I build up enough microsoft site-specific
> tasks to do so (how i've been handling the MS site for some time now
> since it seems the company has decided to require its own browser for a
> readible version of its site's content).

That problem arises because part of the content of biztalk.org is
expressed using non-compliant HTML.  It has nothing to do with
XML compliance.

> But let's just say for the sake of argument that the examples on the
> site were well-formed XML -- my question is this:   Just because the
> DOCUMENT examples they show are well-formed XML, isn't it the SCHEMAS
> that would be validating those documents that would be "breaking" the
> current implementations?

That's absurd.  You might as well say that SMIL "breaks" XML because
it imposes additional restrictions.  No, an XML-1.0-compliant parser
can't tell you whether a given document is SMIL.  Why should it
be able to?  As long as SMIL documents are well-formed XML (they are),
there is no problem.

> It was my understanding that, at this time,
> any schema syntax-based validation-mechanism, by definition, does not
> conform to the XML v. 1.0 Recommendation. Is this not true?

The XML 1.0 Rec does not *prescribe* any validation mechanism other
than DTDs.  Applications can, should, and must require validation
above what DTD-validation provides.

> Said another way:  Since a currently-implemented, XML v. 1.0-compliant
> validating parser would not be able to use a BizTalk schema to validate
> documents (since BizTalk schemas use syntax that is not specified in the
> version 1.0 Recommendation), wouldn't such an existing XML v.
> 1.0-compliant parser implementation "break" as a result, unless its
> creators had also implemented whatever additional, non-standard (and
> therefore proprietary) software that BizTalk requires?

"Nonstandard" does not mean proprietary.  SAX is not a standard,
but it is hardly proprietary.
 
> Wouldn't a more "compliant" BizTalk strategy be to have BizTalk using
> DTDs for now,

Biztalk restrictions may not be expressible using DTDs, which would
not be a deficiency.  The rules that specify RDF aren't specifiable
by a DTD either.

> That way, developers wouldn't have to choose one
> schema syntax over another (and at the expense of being incompatible
> with everything else) because the schema syntaxes would all be
> compatible - with each other AND early implementations that used the
> BizTalk DTDs for validation.

As long as the W3C-compliant schemas and the Microsoft schemas have
the same meaning, one may freely create Biztalk-compliant documents
without fear that they will change meanings.

> Also, on a less technical, more practical note: Why would anyone want to
> put time into using the BizTalk schemas if they know are going to just
> have to redo them again when Microsoft, in good faith, changes the
> BizTalk schemas over to the W3C's Schema syntax?

Distinguish between the syntax of Biztalk documents themselves,
and the syntax used to express the schemas that describe them.

> Why doesn't MS use the closest thing it can to the W3C Schema syntax for
> now, if it can't wait --rather than an undefined mishmash of two W3C
> member submissions and one unfinished white paper from almost year ago?

Maybe they don't understand the current Schema draft yet, not to mention
it is imcomplete as of now.

-- 
John Cowan	http://www.ccil.org/~cowan		cowan@ccil.org
	You tollerday donsk?  N.  You tolkatiff scowegian?  Nn.
	You spigotty anglease?  Nnn.  You phonio saxo?  Nnnn.
		Clear all so!  'Tis a Jute.... (Finnegans Wake 16.5)

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