RE: "Binary XML" proposals

["Clark C. Evans" <cce@clarkevans.com>]

On Tue, 10 Apr 2001, Al Snell wrote:
> And let's not forget image. To many programmers, XML *looks* inefficient
> and awkward. That was my first thought when presented with the idea of
> using it for data interchange; luckily I was enamoured enough of the good
> work being done on various interesting schemas that suggested this data
> format (although technically lacking in many respects) may actually
> achieve "ubiquitous" status.

XML is going to suceed where other file formats have
failed beacuse it is auditable -- I, a mere human, can
pull up the code and read it with my own eyes and
without an intermediate reader which could be at fault.

> In *my* binary XML format project I'm not just going for speed, storage,
> simpler parsing, and no more string quoting headaches; I'm also laying a
> foundation that extends XML, allowing for attributes with arbitrary
> markup, large binary objects inserted into XML, and something a little
> more flexible than entities for "including" stuff. Those "extra" features
> won't do anything when you're just processing normal XML through it, but
> if it takes off in a big way (which will require a lot of marketing on my
> part, I agree) and it becomes the ubiquitous format, then those neat
> features can start to be used in those good schemas. That's a bit of an
> idealistic dream, but You Never Know.

Good luck. But if you are "extending XML" don't call it XML, or
even "binary XML".  That would be bad.  

It is interesting that your project is the antithesis 
of SML-DEV, where we *love* the textual XML format
but just think that the structure is a bit too complicated.

Interesting...

Clark

P.S.  I agree wholeheartedly with Tim Bray and Sean
      McGrath's posts.  Binary XML is dead on arrival.
      Getting away from binary formats is the _entire_
      reason for XML.  Being able to audit your
      inputs and outputs.