RE: [xml-dev] You call that a standard?

["Dare Obasanjo" <dareo@microsoft.com>]

Nope, what you've described is a specification. Anyone can slap a document with some rules in it one the Web. Does that make it a standard? I designed a query language for XML when I was in college and you can read the description at http://www.xmldb.org/sixdml/sixdml-lang.html/. By your definition, it is a standard. To me that is worse than meaningless. It is meaninglessness masquerading as being meaningful. 
 
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________________________________

From: Alexander Jerusalem [mailto:ajerulists@vknn.org]
Sent: Wed 4/28/2004 9:58 AM
To: xml-dev
Subject: Re: [xml-dev] You call that a standard?



I don't agree at all. If a term has many meanings, that doesn't make
it's meaningless. To deny this, is just a way of avoiding a necessary
debate. A standard is a set of more or less strict rules that are known
by a common name by which different parties can refer to it. And I
think, you accept that every day for all practical purposes.


Dare Obasanjo wrote:

> The word "standard' when it comes to software and computer technology is usually meaningless. Is something standard if it produced by a standards body but has no conformance tests (e.g. SQL)? What if it has conformance testing requirements but is owned by a single entity (e.g. Java)? What if it is just widely supported with no formal body behind it (e.g. RSS)?
> 
> Whenever I hear someone say standard it's as meaningless to me as when I hear the acronym 'SOA', it means whatever the speaker wants it to mean.
> 


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