Re: [xml-dev] Preoccupation with zero, empty strings, empty elements,emp

[Dimitre Novatchev <dnovatchev@gmail.com>]

In a field (math) both the "zero" and "one" elements are of equal importance.

Of course, division by zero is prohibited :)

Cheers,
Dimitre.



On Sat, Dec 7, 2013 at 5:34 AM, Costello, Roger L. <costello@mitre.org> wrote:
> Hi Folks,
>
> When was the last time you went to the store to purchase zero oranges?
>
> When was the last time you created an XML document to have zero elements?
>
> Those are strange concepts, aren't they?
>
> Zero is a strange concept.
>
> Roughly 1500 years after the introduction of zero as a number by mathematicians in India, the concept is still not well accepted in computer science:
>
>         - Many programming languages do not
>           support records with zero fields
>
>         - Many programming languages do not
>           support arrays with zero elements
>
>         - Many programming languages do not
>           support variable definitions with zero
>           variables
>
>         - In some programming languages the
>           syntax for calling a routine with zero
>           parameters differs from that for a
>           routine with one or more parameters
>
>         - XML has a special syntax for empty
>           elements
>
>         - Many compilers refuse to compile a
>           module that defines zero names
>
>         - No parser generator can produce a
>           parser for the empty language (the
>           language with zero strings)
>
> This preoccupation with empty strings, sets, languages, etc. is not frivolous, since it is well-known that the ease with which a system handles empty cases is a measure of its cleanliness and robustness.
>
> Most (not all) of the above is from the book: "Parsing Techniques" by Grune and Jacobs.
>
> /Roger
>
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-- 
Cheers,
Dimitre Novatchev
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