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Hi Harold,
> > In XML 1.0, we have a larger file with no type information
> > and in the computergrid format, we have type information as
> > well as a saving of around 35% or 2,680,000 bytes.
> >
>
> It's smaller, though somehow I doubt that's important....
Well, it can be important in a business context. People in
business don't have unlimited time. If a pricelist or any
document takes too long to load up... they'll simply
give the ctrl-alt-delete and give up. They have no love
for the computers, I can assure you.
> There is no rule anywhere that says that $ means an int or ? means a
> boolean or @ means a date.
Well, it's a rule here.
> You could just as easily (probably more so) written knowledge
> into your code that sell_price and cost_price are ints, InStock
> is a boolean, and Arrival_Date is a date.
Yes, but let me digress. I once worked in a company where any
technical question was answered by "go debug the source code".
Man, that was a hard place to work.
In a business enterprise, you just can't work like that anymore.
Usually there's no source code, and these days the programmers
are in India and the call centre is in a difference province
entirely. And all you want to know is why your payment hasn't
been processed....
So keeping the logic in the code isn't very attractive in 2005..
> The XML document in both cases contains pretty much the same
> information, none of which has anything to do with data types. In both
> cases, the types are inferred by the code processing the XML document.
There might not be any code to process the document. What if there
are elements for which no code exist? Not every business can afford
the money to have coded the processing of every data element from
every business that it deals with.. It's not a perfect world just
yet...
Therefore, a business analyst needs to be able to go in and figure
out what is going on, make a business decision and possibly take some
human action.
Decisions need to be made on the spot in business based on the
information at hand...
> (In fact, maybe that's what you meant. I don't remember.) The types are
> in your code, not i the XML.
Once again... there are much fewer programmers left these days...
> Your custom format requires you to develop and maintain your own custom
> parser because you haven't used XML to markup the relevant structure.
I disagree. I started off with xml in about 1997 and have marked up to
the point where I am now.
Have a nice day..
David
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