Re: [xml-dev] MinML: an experimental, more concise meta-syntax forXML an

["Liam R. E. Quin" <liam@fromoldbooks.org>]

On Tue, 2023-01-03 at 05:24 +0000, Ford Bryan wrote:
> Hi everyone,
> 
> I thought this new blog post might be of interest to members of this
> mailing list:
> 
>         MinML: concise but general markup syntax
>         https://bford.info/2022/12/28/minml/

The strength of XML, the biggest strength, is that the syntax, despite
its warts and quirkiness, works everywhere. Pretty much every
programming language has at least one XML parser, and the degree of
interoperability is unparalleled.

Previous work in this area includes ftanml (there's a Balisage paper
about that one at least) but it's very hard to get any traction.
Markdown succeeded precisely because it doesn't have complex rules  -
although as soon as you get into anything complex Markdown falls over
and feebly kicks its legs in the air like a Corgi on Valium.

Brian Reid's @ syntax, later used by Leslie Lamport for LaTeX, is more
regular, although @ is used for email addresses.

It also looks as if, confusingly, the HTML character entities are built
in to your proposal, instead of the usual XML mechanism of defining
one's own?

Thank you for sharing your ideas.


liam


-- 
Liam Quin, https://www.delightfulcomputing.com/
Available for XML/Document/Information Architecture/XSLT/
XSL/XQuery/Web/Text Processing/A11Y training, work & consulting.
Barefoot Web-slave, antique illustrations:  http://www.fromoldbooks.org