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On Tue, Apr 13, 2004 at 11:57:21AM -0400, Rich Salz wrote:
> > Can we stop arguing about whether a binary alternative to XML
> >is, can, or should be called "XML"? The case has been made over and
> >over again that if it ain't pointy brackets and all the other stuff in
> >the XML specifications, then it ain't XML!
>
> I think that when even a W3C Activity Lead uses the "wrong" term, as
> recently as a couple of weeks ago, that it is premature to call for an
> end to discussion about the terminology.
I've tried to be very careful in my use of terminology; I don't claim
to be infallible, although where I've used variations it's (at least
sometimes) been deliberate...
Some possibilities in the future might include, for example, a format
or framework for interchange at the infoset level, or even a direct
encoding that can be declared in an XML encoding declaration,
<?xml version="1.1" encoding="w3c-binary-thingie-1.0"?>
(in which case no revision to XML is needed; this is sneaky, rather
like Tim Bray's character entity proposal a while ago, and the name
"binary XML encoding" would be appropriate)
There's nothing in the XML Specification that requires specific code
points to be transmitted for pointy brackets. You can transmit an
EBCDIC-encoded file if you like. The XML Processor is responsible
for mapping to Unicode code points.
As Rich Salz points out, there is not complete consensus.
Best,
Liam
--
Liam Quin, W3C XML Activity Lead, http://www.w3.org/People/Quin/
http://www.holoweb.net/~liam/
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