RE: [xml-dev] xml:lang how often used?

["Michael Kay" <mike@saxonica.com>]

>  I think though now I just realized a really perverse and 
> strange use case I hadn't thought of for having a language 
> identifier different than xml:lang, which is that xml:lang 
> sets the language specification for all attributes + contents 
> of an element, but you could theoretically see situations 
> where attributes for some reason had a different language 

Obvious example, not remotely strange or perverse:

<dictionary xml:lang="fr">
  <term name="Computer">Ordinateur</term>
  <term name="Software">Logiciel</term>
  <term name="File">Fichier</term>
</dictionary>

Now one can have an endless debate about whether one should use xml:lang
there or some other attribute. Frankly I don't care. I think it misses the
point: XML is about syntax, not semantics, and document designers should be
free to choose their own tags.

Michael Kay
http://www.saxonica.com/