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RE: ??? (was RE: A simple guy with a simple problem)

• From: "Bullard, Claude L (Len)" <clbullar@i...>
• To: lauren@s..., xml-dev@l...
• Date: Thu, 15 Mar 2001 12:45:22 -0600

Competence: knowing how to pick the right 
number of objects to juggle.

Someone asked on the VRML list what the ISO 
standard bought us.  I replied "for five 
years, no one can touch it".  My V-Realm 3D
editor came from a company now dead.  The 
editor still produces a file a VRML 
browser can play even if it can't produce 
the latest extensions.  This week my son 
is learning geometry and scene graph 
concepts from a failed standard whose 
nodes still play on a state of the art 
browser.  The only reason the tech 
still works is the standard is a year shy 
of version next.

Some areas of technology need  
rapid spec and development cycles over the  
alternative of proprietarization because 
they are too unstable to standardize.  For 
others, avoiding the randomizing tweaks 
of busy hands is necessary to make the 
cost of using them justifiable and to maintain 
their usefulness despite changes in the technology.  

A friend of mine who juggles says he can juggle 
lots of objects if he can toss them high enough.

Len 
http://www.mp3.com/LenBullard

Ekam sat.h, Vipraah bahudhaa vadanti.
Daamyata. Datta. Dayadhvam.h


-----Original Message-----
From: Lauren Wood [mailto:lauren@s...]
Sent: Thursday, March 15, 2001 11:36 AM
To: xml-dev@l...
Subject: Re: ??? (was RE: A simple guy with a simple problem)

Tim Bray wrote:
> 
> At 03:47 PM 14/03/01 -0600, Bullard, Claude L (Len) wrote:
> >We can't treat XML
> >spec work as an XP programming
> >exercise.
> 
> I think that is *exactly* what the W3C should start
> doing.  And if you look at its successes, you detect a
> strong XP flavor - don't bite off too much, fix the
> three biggest problems and then see what the next big
> problem is, etc.  -Tim

This does have to be tempered by the "don't hamstring yourself in the
future" mentality though; in the DOM WG we spent a lot of time trying to
avoid future problems (those we could guess at, anyway) while simultaneously
doing the minimal amount to declare victory and doing enough to make it
worthwhile doing anything at all. That juggling act is not easy at all.

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