Re: [xml-dev] DOM's javascript roots (was Re: [xml-dev] Have JDOM / XOM

[Tatu Saloranta <cowtowncoder@yahoo.com>]

--- Robin Berjon <robin.berjon@expway.fr> wrote:


> It is an urban legend. How you use the DOM varies
> not only from  
> language to language but also from implementation to
> implementation.

But this is beyond the point -- it's the perception of
DOM usage being the same. Managers only see this
supposed increase in inter-operability (which, like
you point out, is a fallacy in reality).
  
> > Part of the reason of which probably is that,
> since
> > DOM  was created FOR Javascript (standardized what
> > Netscape had built for its needs)
> 
> No, I don't think that's true. If the DOM had been
> created for  
> Javascript it would be a *lot* less horrible than
> all the hoops it  
> had to jump through to support utterly braindead
> languages like Java.

Huh? Yes, going towards lowest common denominator
caused even more problems (more so than cleaning up
some of NS mess -- yes, DOM standard did some cleanup,
after NS hacked 'version 0'; but no fundamental
changes): but those have little to do with Java, and
more to do with scripting vs. non-scripting language
differences.
Fact is that "DOM0" (model Netscape created for its
browsers, and that was the starting point for DOM
standard process) was written for a scripting language
(Javascript -- or, they co-evolved); and of course it
then happens to be more convenient to use from a
scripting language than from a more static language
(Java, C/C++, C#, ...). 
Programming languages generally show traits of what
they were built/planned to be used for: C for writing
OS, Pascal for teaching CS, C++ for phone switches (or
something more sinister judging by its complexity),
Java for multiple things during its development (1.0.2
seemed like it was designed to be used for
implementing web browsers). Ditto for APIs: even
though DOM was to be cross-language, it still has its
roots in that dang Netscape browser, cobbled together
to allow nifty new dynamic features.

And of course its use for XML was an afterthought as
well: it all started with HTML. Is it any surprise
that namespace support, then, was an ugly bolted-in
monstrosity? Few people then understood namespaces,
and not many do now.

Barking at Java is pointless; all the other current
mainstream OO languages (plus C) would have similar
constraints on API design; and like Elliotte pointed
out, everything for everyone (aka "general solution to
the general problem") is a recipe for failure.

-+ Tatu +-


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