Re: [xml-dev] What are the practical, negative consequences ofthinking t

If you are thinking in database terms, it makes no sense. There is just two different syntaxes for fields.

If you are thinking in document terms, then it makes complete sense. You are marking up text that can exist independent of the tag or type: the text is the data content and the markup is the metadata: element tags and attribute tags and attribute values (and comments and PIs) are all metadata. The attributes are metadata about the element tag, and the element tag is metadata about the data content.

Regards

Rick

On Thu, Feb 16, 2017 at 2:24 AM, Costello, Roger L. <costello@mitre.org> wrote:

Hi Folks,

Consider this XML:

<Book binding="hardcover">
<Title>Software Abstractions</Title>
<Author>Daniel Jackson</Author>
</Book>

I often hear people say that attributes are metadata. For example, @binding is metadata.

David Carlisle likes to remind me that there is nothing in the XML specification which says that attributes are metadata. In fact, the XML specification does not even use the word "metadata."

So when I hear people talking about attributes being metadata, I channel David Carlisle and tell them that attributes are not metadata.

But I'm thinking this is a lost cause. The belief that attributes are metadata is too widespread.

Besides, what difference does it make if people think that attributes are metadata? Can you give me a concrete, practical example showing where bad things happen because someone thought that attributes are metadata?

/Roger

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