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Simon St.Laurent wrote: > At 11:20 PM 7/29/00 -0400, Jonathan Borden wrote: > >Why XML then? What is so special about well-formnedness. I assert that any > >information you can supply in a well-formed document, I can supply in a > >non-well formed document. > > Yes, but if I provide it to you as a well-formed document, you can at least > process the characters I send you according to XML syntax. > > If I don't, you can't. > Suppose we agree on MIME? If you send me a MIME document, I can process the characters using a MIME parser in 'MIME syntax' -- so what? It is always possible to send a perfectly well formed XML document that is totally useless e.g. <doc> <byte>67</byte> <byte>121</byte>... </doc> The point is that some people might view XML as just a bunch of pointy brackets, and so what if the syntax is perfect *who cares*. Suppose your English syntax is perfect but you have nothing to say? What do I care about syntax? The only reason we *need* agreed upon syntax is that we have something to say to eachother (i.e. semantics). What interests me about XML is the possibility of creating semantically meaningful documents. Jonathan Borden http://www.openhealth.org
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