Celebrate the XML Decade

IdaAshley writes "IBM Systems Journal recently published an issue dedicated to XML's 10th anniversary. Take a look at XML application techniques, and general discussion of the technical, economic and even cultural effects of XML. Learn why XML has been successful, and what it would take for XML to continue its success."

Comments

Re:Celebrate the XML Decade

[dubbayu_d_40]

Maybe you should get another job dumbass.

When does a buzz word unbuzz

[cnlohfin3109]

Does this mean XML is no longer a buzz word? or is it still a way for self-important elitist 30 year old c programmers to feel superior by placing everything not used by them into a box so they can avoid change? does this make me a troll? I guess after 5 hours of applying the pumping lemma on theory of comp homework left me grumpy.

XML -- The answer to a problem that didn't exist..

[FlyingGuy]

XML is just a pathetic attempt to do what SQL already does quite nicely thank you very much

You cqn query an SQL server and get the schema, then its a simple query for the data. Its all wrapped up quite nicely and its very logical and it works. Why oh why do these people continue to dream up this hierarchical madness!

So lets see, whats easier. You need data, you go to the data source and you request the schema of what you are getting. It comes from a table, a view or a query, but its a schema with defined field names and types. Then you query for the data, it comes in nicely packaged records and there you have it!. Now lets do it the XML way. You request some data. Then you spend the next several billion CPU cycles traversing up and down a hierarchical tree, building tempory array's etc. ad nauseum to get the data all sorted out.

Using a markup language that was designed to describe the layout of a page for data transfer is just plain stupid. STOP trying to make a one size fits all, use what is the simplest method for each task. You want to do page markup, use SMGL and its derivitives, you want to move data, use SQL, thats what it was designed for! This keeps the bug count low, it keeps troublshooting simple, it removes data from layout, its just a right way to do things.

Re:Why XML was successful

[master_p]

They were people who were often not likely to know about a bracket-matching option in an editor or about code indenting, for example. But they were still legitimate users.

WTF? So just because some users couldn't figure out how to turn on parenthesis or bracket matching in their products, you ended up with the mess that is XML?

There you have it people, straight for the horse's mouth: our civilization is actually based on random poorly thought-out decisions made by a few almost-ignorant fellows.

If we take into account how lame most of the software products are, (for example: how many holes there are in C-based apps, how lame XML is, how horrible WIN32 is, how bad socket APIs are, how complex J2EE is etc), then we ought to be ashamed of ourselves as humanity...and of course with such badly designed software, the sky is not the limit...

Re:Why XML was successful

[Eivind Eklund]

XML is shitty to deal with because it separate "attributes" and "elements". Avoid attributes. They are an abomination unto Nuggan. Oh, and I'd also like back references and a simpler format - but then again, I'd end up with YAML and could just as well just ditch the XML.

Eivind.