JAXP and Java XML APIs (was RE: [xml-dev] difference bet. xerces andcrimson)

[Leigh Dodds <ldodds@ingenta.com>]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Dylan Walsh [mailto:Dylan.Walsh@kadius.com]
> Sent: 26 September 2001 17:17
> To: gharesh@vsnl.com; Xml-Dev
> Subject: RE: [xml-dev] difference bet. xerces and crimson

[Crimson/Xerces comparison snipped]

> Xerces supports the JAXP API, so if you write your code to use that API
> exclusively, you can use either parser and switch between them using a
> simple configuration change.

I've been strongly recommending JAXP mainly because of this reason.
I had some reservations about it initially, simply because it didn't
offer very much (adding a few factory classes isn't that much effort).
However the improvements in JAXP 1.1 caused me to revise my opinion.

To me, JAXP seems to be the 'best practice' API for Java (acknowledging
that not everyone agrees on the precise meaning of 'best practice').
With the only apparent downside being that you 'lose out' on the ability
to use APIs like JDOM and dom4j.

However quotes such as that on todays Cafe Con Leche (from this
jdom-interest posting [1]) make me wonder if I'm missing out on a trick or
two somewhere.

I can only attribute this '3 months saving' to the difficulty in the DOM
model. From my own experiences the amount of code I have to write
could have been greatly reduced by a means to query a DOM using
XPath; something which seems to be on the way.

Anyone else have any thoughts on this?

Cheers,

L.

[1].
http://lists.denveronline.net/lists/jdom-interest/2001-September/008297.html


--
Leigh Dodds, Research Group, ingenta | "Pluralitas non est ponenda
http://weblogs.userland.com/eclectic |    sine necessitate"
http://www.xml.com/pub/xmldeviant    |     -- William of Ockham