Re: [xml-dev] What's wrong with namespaces? Some observations andsuggest

[Amelia A Lewis <amyzing@talsever.com>]

Well, to clarify:

On Fri, 03 Dec 2010 23:16:21 -0500, Liam R E Quin wrote:
> On Fri, 2010-12-03 at 20:34 -0500, Amelia A Lewis wrote:
> 
>> So.  Herewith, some strongly opinionated judgments as to what's wrong 
>> with namespaces:
> 
> Amy - I, too, spend a lot of time explaining namespaces to people.
> I agree they stink.
> 
> But I also don't see much consensus on
> (1) is the disruption of change worth any benefits of improving them?
> (2) what exactly should be done differently?
> (3) a clear story on compatibility and moving forward if there's change.

I agree.  I think that there are problems, and I think that trying to 
explicate those problems, to characterize them as clearly as possible, 
is valuable.  I don't think, at the moment, that there are enough 
people agreed on the characterization of the problem to seek a solution 
in standards-space.  I doubt, in fact, that it would be possible to 
move forward with the suggestions in my note (or "rant," if you 
prefer).  It's perfectly possible to adopt the whole 
"fully-qualified-name" thing as a convention (in instances and 
schemata), and even to add it as an extension in processors (XPath/XSLT 
and the like).

But I doubt that we'll see such a thing.

In fact, I'd expect my post to draw competing analyses (and perhaps I'd 
end up agreeing with them, in the end).  We just aren't to the stage of 
knowing well-enough what to do that would be better.  "Simpler," 
yes--Simon was proposing that *years* ago, presciently, it now seems.  
But what, exactly, is simple enough to satisfy, and rich enough to 
thrive?  I don't know.  I think my characterization of namespaces might 
feed the discussion--I hope so.  Certainly there *will* be a 
successor.  Now?  I think not yet.  But eventually.

Amy!
-- 
Amelia A. Lewis                    amyzing {at} talsever.com
Being your slave, what should I do but tend
upon the hours and times of your desire?
I have no precious time at all to spend,
nor services to do, till you require.