Injective, Surjective, and Bijective XML Data Models ... ApplyingConce

["Costello, Roger L." <costello@mitre.org>]

Hi Folks,

When you create an XML data model, do you ask yourself:

      What properties do I want this XML data model 
      to possess?

Until recently, I didn't.

Mathematicians frequently talk about properties such as the commutative property and the associative property. But do data modelers talk about properties?

For a couple years I have wondered how properties apply to XML. What properties would I want an XML data model to possess?

Category Theory has opened my eyes to the idea of applying properties to XML data models. In this paper I describe three properties that you may want your XML data models to possess: injective, surjective, and bijective. I describe what these terms mean and how they are relevant to XML.

More ... http://www.xfront.com/Injective-Surjective-Bijective-XML-Data-Models.pdf

Comments welcome.

/Roger