Re: [xml-dev] An inquiry into the nature of XML and how it orients our perception of information

On Sat, Nov 21, 2009 at 11:49:03AM -0800, Tim Bray wrote:
> It seems to me at a pretty deep level that O-O is
> about hiding and encapsulation; an object is a thing that can do some things
> on demand, don't bother your pretty little head about how it's done.  
> 
> It seems to me like XML is oriented exactly 180? in the opposite direction:
> Here's the data, here are some labels for the data, here are some ordering
> and containment relationships, you're free to do whatever you want with it.

+1

> That's a good thing and (I've always the big win) - the provider doesn't
> constrain what the receiver does.  -Tim

Yup, agreed 100% - it's why you can't speak of an XML document as
a function, but, rather, an XML processor is a function that takes
one or more XML documents as inputs...

The semantics in XML are extrinsic, not intrinsic.

Liam


-- 
Liam Quin, W3C XML Activity Lead, http://www.w3.org/People/Quin/
http://www.holoweb.net/~liam/ * http://www.fromoldbooks.org/