RE: [xml-dev] SGML complexity

[<juanrgonzaleza@canonicalscience.com>]

natyoung - Artizen at Cisco\ said:
> Hi.
>
>> Sure that figures _only_ assure us that there exist more
>> books on PHP or
>> JS than XSLT on Amazon database.
>>
>> But it is an usual practice in many fields sizing the
>> activity/popularity
>> in a field from the quantity of stuff is being written about.
>
> It's usual practice in all kinds of fields, especially politics, but
> more generally anywhere that uninformed public opinion is assumed to
> matter, to choose and present slices of data primarily on the basis of
> how well they fit your agenda.
>
> The three things I've seen argued on this list where a variety of
> stastical garbage has been mustered in support of subjective viewpoints
> are:
>  - XSLT is more/less powerful than (technology X)
>  - XSLT is more/less easy to learn than (technology X)
> and now:
>  - XSLT is more/less popular than (technology X)
>
> What would we gain by proving a particular answer to any of the above
> questions, even assuming such proof was possible?
>
> ---->N

I will remember you each time i heard viewpoints, specially when becoming
from the W3C (all of next is indexed by Google):

<blockquote>
Use CSS when you can, use XSL when you must.

The reason is that CSS is much easier to use, easier to learn, thus easier
to maintain and cheaper.
</blockquote>

<blockquote>
While XHTML 1.0 is a powerful language, support for the full XHTML 1.0
feature set may be too much to expect browsers on cell phones and other
small devices to handle.
</blockquote>

<blockquote>
XSLT is cool and powerful
</blockquote>

<blockquote>
It's important to understand that it's much more than just a styling
language, and that it's vastly more powerful than CSS (or even CSS2).
</blockquote>

<blockquote>
Anyone using XML can now take advantage of XSLT, a powerful new tool for
manipulating, converting or styling documents
</blockquote>

<blockquote>
Web services are a direct outgrowth of XML's popularity.
</blockquote>

<blockquote>
Ikivo Animator 2.0 is expected to ship by the end of July and Ikivo are
committed to update the tool further as the popularity of SVG Tiny 1.2
content develops.
</blockquote>

<blockquote>
One of the main reasons given for dsssl failing ever to be really popular
was its use of scheme lisp syntax. It's immediate descendent, XSLT which
uses a far more verbose XML syntax has ended up being perhaps the most
successful new programming language introduced in recent years and is
probably the most widely installed programming language ever.
</blockquote>

<blockquote>
Tools and easier internationalization are crucial reasons for XML's
popularity.
</blockquote>

<blockquote>
Much like the world wide adoption of HTML, MathML has grown in popularity
due to it's implementation across a wide range of products.
</blockquote>

<blockquote>
Some XML software providers, such as DataChannel and Bluestone Software,
are touting XML and HTTP as a Web component model. Bluestone executives
believes XML's ease of use will quickly make it more popular than CORBA,
EJB, and COM.
</blockquote>

<Etc/>


Juan R.

Center for CANONICAL |SCIENCE)