Nice comparison. Recently I heard an XML guru from MS (I know, invitation for flaming) use the interoperability of light bulbs as an analogy for why XML is good. He obviously wasn't a lightbulb guru.
Have you ever tried to use an American lightbulb in Europe? Or an Australian lightbulb in a Dutch light socket? For that matter, even the Dutch have two different sizes.
The problem set is not new . . .
-----Original Message-----
From: Sean McGrath [mailto:sean.mcgrath@propylon.com]
Sent: 07 July 2001 18:09
To: xml-dev@lists.xml.org
Subject: How many XML gurus does it take to change a light bulb?
Q. How many XML gurus does it take to change a light bulb?
A. Eight:
1 to create a syntax for expressing light bulbs
2 to create broadly similar yet different APIs for interacting with light bulbs
1 to argue that the API differences can be resolved by splitting the
universe of light bulb applications into
physical-model and logical-model camps.
1 to argue that no single, cohesive model is possible.
1 to disagree and invent yet another "gee! all light bulbs can be though of
it terms of nodes and arcs" model.
1 to question the sanity of all this and just get stuff working by hacking
simple lightbulb instances
into relational databases and processing them with Perl.
1 to write the meta-light-bulb joke about it and post it on xml-dev
Sean
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