RE: [xml-dev] Universal Schema to Validate an Arbitrary Well-Formed Document

On Wed, 2004-05-19 at 16:25, Dare Obasanjo wrote:
> It can't be done. You need to at least provide a name for the top level element. What you can do is specify that the content model of an element can be any content. 
>  

That's what I'd feared.

This seems a considerable flaw in XML Schema and by association WSDL.

To elaborate on why we wanted such a schema...

It's our practical observation that a loosely-coupled document based
web-service ought only apply constraints to enforce tight/tighter
coupling as necessary (typically production) but when possible the
constraints are best kept loose - this is particularly the case during
development, when data model and process may be in flux.

In other words the development philosophy is - create the
service/process and constrain after the fact as necessary.

It seems like XSD and WSDL approach the world with the opposite
philosophy mandating that a schema be developed before the service.

Peter Rodgers
1060 NetKernel  http://www.1060.org