RE: intertwined specs

["Bullard, Claude L (Len)" <clbullar@ingr.com>]

As I sort my way through the XQuery draft, it has a 
way of looking like an ASP page with all of the 
<% %> delimiters removed.  Ok.  I can 
see the utility of it (alternative to the SQL variants 
popping up from every vendor), and the overlap 
with XSLT (transforms in the query).  So far so good. 
I can see the sense of this.  The stored procedure 
guys should love it.

MSL:  well, ok as long as these are formal 
proofs among interested parties as to the 
correctness of parts, no problem.  If this 
enters the production systems, it is not 
something most will welcome outside the 
deepgeeks with the faster propellors. So, 
it will be an academic exercise similar to 
the early DSSSL with Scheme/LISP.  Good 
to have for formal work; not something 
the production folks will want to work with 
unless it is made *very* friendly by tools. 
Even then...

Keep in mind what someone made very clear 
very passionately in Vancouver when this 
SGML On The Web thing was a'bornin' and 
people had to agree to walk away from the 
advanced state of extant solid work:

"It has to be simple."  Jean Paoli- Microsoft

Len 
http://www.mp3.com/LenBullard

Ekam sat.h, Vipraah bahudhaa vadanti.
Daamyata. Datta. Dayadhvam.h


-----Original Message-----
From: Michael Rys [mailto:mrys@microsoft.com]

I just want to point out that you do not necessarily need to learn the
algebra to do the selection. But as with relational database systems and
SQL, it certainly does help if the queries become more complex...