Re: [xml-dev] Wikipedia on XML

[Robert Koberg <rob@koberg.com>]

On Aug 7, 2009, at 9:34 AM, Elliotte Rusty Harold wrote:

> On Fri, Aug 7, 2009 at 9:09 AM, Robert Koberg<rob@koberg.com> wrote:
>
>> How do you get/set a start or end tag in an XML context? Do you?
>
> You don't. Getting and setting are concepts of some programming
> languages. They are not concepts that are relevant to XML as XML. They
> are not concepts that are relevant to XML as XML.
>
>> In a DOM (W3, XOM, dom4j, etc) or transformation language (like XSL  
>> or
>> Xquery), there is no concept of a start or end tag. The only place  
>> a start
>> or end tag comes into play is in a SAX style. There they are events  
>> that can
>> be consumed or emitted.
>
> They aren't in SAX either. The events are named startElement and
> endElement for good reason.

Well, exactly!

So, why define tags the way the wikipedia article (or the w3) does?  
Why define them at all?

That is why I wrote that they should be considered more like events.  
Though, as you point out, the events would be even better defined as  
startElement/endElement as they are in SAX.

best,
-Rob