RE: [xml-dev] Ten Years Later - XML 1.0 Fifth Edition?

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

>Are there real-world scenarios where current applications break? (I don't mean corner cases in implementers test suites, I mean actual applications that somehow depend a parser rejecting documents that would be accepted under the proposed edited recommendation).

 

I would think there are very many applications that would break if obscure characters start appearing in names or IDs. But most of them would break on obscure characters that XML 1.0 already allows. The interesting case is an application that (a) handles all XML 1.0 names correctly, (b) can't handle all XML 1.0.5 names, and (c) actually starts receiving documents containing XML 1.0.5 names. I suspect that won't happen very often. But it doesn't alter the fact that someone who deploys such an application is entitled to prevent failures happening by configuring it to use a parser that enforces the rules his application is relying on, and that's going to be a lot easier to achieve if different versions of the specification are properly numbered.

 

After all, the extended character set is being supported to meet the needs of a minority community. In meeting their needs, we mustn't forget the needs of another minority community, namely those who care about high integrity systems.

 

Michael Kay

http://www.saxonica.com/

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From: Michael Champion [mailto:mc@xegesis.org]
Sent: 22 February 2008 05:59
To: XML Developers List
Subject: Re: [xml-dev] Ten Years Later - XML 1.0 Fifth Edition?