Re: [xml-dev] An easy-to-use technology is a double-edged sword (XML is

[Thomas Lord <lord@emf.net>]

Mike 'The magnum' Brookman wrote:
> I think your all wangers!!!

While there is a slang term "wanger" it is probably not what
you mean.   You mean "wanker".  The word is "wanker".

I'm not sure I agree although I can see how you'd get that.

My impression is that the places where vocabulary re-use is
taking off are many, but diffuse and specialized.   The most
impressive examples are the cases where domain experts who
don't normally write software come together under an effort
to create an institutional or industry standard.

For example, you might get librarians helping to develop
XML vocabularies for MARC and other and new bibliographic
record standards.

First, getting those domain experts involved can and seems to
often result in a higher-quality result, at least if there are also
software experts there to help them understand their choices and
to avoid pitfalls.

Second, getting those domain experts involved "spreads the
gospel" across organizations so that later, for example, if
software manager A and software manager B both go to the
pointy-hair boss and propose some new project,  A may have
a better chance than B if he's referring to the standards that
the domain experts are also talking about.   The PHB hears
from the experts on one side (say, the librarians): ok, X makes
sense to us;  then hears from manager A that he wants to build
X.

How do you build those communities of discourse, though?
How do you manage to get domain experts, pointy hair bosses,
and programmers all speaking a common language about XML
issues?

That's not easy.

It seems to me that a lot of the "wanking" on this list is among
people who are bouncing their pitches off one another -- trying
to hone in on ways of speaking about XML that all of those
constituencies can understand and pick up on.

-t