RE: [xml-dev] XML spec and XSD

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

> XSD is a failure by any sane technical measure.

Yes, it's ugly, and very hard to use, and doesn't do a lot of things that
people might like it to do.

But you could say all that of Windows, and Windows is not exactly a failure,
though you could argue that in a saner world it would be.

There are other measures of success that are not entirely insane:

(a) it meets all the requirements that were specified at the start of the
project.

(b) it has half a dozen decent implementations, with a level of
interoperability that's not unreasonable by computer industry standards
(much better than SQL, for example).

(c) it's used by large numbers of people, many of whom have a choice.

(d) it does most of the things that most of those people need it to do.

(e) it underpins a large number of industry standards that enable effective
interchange of data around the world, creating enormous value by oiling the
wheels of commerce.

If it were really such a total failure, wouldn't the spec be gathering dust,
rather than being actively discussed on this list?

Regards,

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