xml-dev - Re: Future of Formatting Objects (XSL/FO)

[Sebastian Rahtz <sebastian.rahtz@computing-services.oxford.ac.uk>]

Thierry Hanser writes:
 > As I am not expert in page-media publishing, I am
 > not able to evaluate the current power of FO and its
 > fitness with the wide field of paper-like publishing
 > It seems to me that the FO specifications are pretty
 > well designed (at last a humanly readable rendering model)
 > and quite comprehensive but I might be wrong.

You express my feelings exactly. "pretty well designed" and "quite
comprehensive". It is a promising start, but until

 - the spec is finished
 - we see some chance of ongoing commitment to updating it
 - we have a reasonably complete implementation

I personally would not advise my pension fund to invest in it...

What worries me is that XSL FO's parents are DSSSL and CSS. Not a
very healthy start. DSSSL was never accepted by any major player, or
implemented to the extent one could do top-quality typesetting with it;
and CSS, well what can one say, it's like one's more embarassing
relatives, those you hope keep quiet when the boss comes to dinner. Not
exactly unimplemented, but implemented so badly and so incompletely it
leaves a nasty taste in the mouth.

Sebastian


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