Re: "Binary XML" proposals

[Murali Mani <mani@CS.UCLA.EDU>]

Hi,

One more mail for the day -- I think we should take a look once at
"XML in 10 points" - available at the W3C's page --
http://www.w3.org/XML/1999/XML-in-10-points

It emphasizes that XML will be a text format and not a binary format --
1. XML is a method for putting structured data in a text file
3. XML is text, but isn't meant to be read
5. XML is verbose, but that is not a problem

especially the explanation for 5 might be useful.

cheers and regards - murali.

On Tue, 10 Apr 2001, David Brownell wrote:

> > > Binary formats are bad because they tend towards being
> > > proprietary, and that's the last thing that should happen to
> > > the world's next "intellectual commons".
> >
> > True in the document world, perhaps. But not so obviously true
> > in the protocol world. For example, DNS question and answer
> > payloads are an example of an open, structured, binary format.
>
> I'm fully aware.  But you also ought to consider exactly how
> open and extensible DNS is -- by seeing whether you can
> get to two hands when you count implementations (BIND,
> and hardly any other servers), and extensions (rare).
>
> Basically, every binary RPC protocol I've ever seen has been
> converted, sooner or later, into a conduit for proprietary
> platforms.  Fragmenting a previously-unified (XML=text)
> world by creating a binary variant seems a fine start, for any
> organizations wanting to head that direction.  Large vendors
> can afford the duplicate investments, when they can forsee
> it opens the door to more vendor lock-in.  The rest of the world
> may well prefer to do smarter things with their time/money
> than helping raise more barriers to market entry.
>
> There's also the "out of sight, out of mind" issue.  Once things
> get binary, the number of people who can detect mistakes
> (much less shenanigans!) declines by orders of magnitude.
> That means that interop becomes more fragile; which also
> pushes things towards proprietary behaviors/bugsets.
>
> - Dave
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------
> The xml-dev list is sponsored by XML.org, an initiative of OASIS
> <http://www.oasis-open.org>
>
> The list archives are at http://lists.xml.org/archives/xml-dev/
>
> To unsubscribe from this elist send a message with the single word
> "unsubscribe" in the body to: xml-dev-request@lists.xml.org
>