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Re: Fallacies of Validation, version #2

• To: Jonathan Robie <jonathan.robie@d...>
• Subject: Re: Fallacies of Validation, version #2
• From: w3c@d...
• Date: Fri, 27 Aug 2004 08:47:36 -0400
• Cc: Bryan Rasmussen <bry@i...>, xml-dev@l...
• In-reply-to: <412E46BA.4040602@d...>
• References: <200408261412.i7QECKS10981@s...> <1093547898.412e377a2996d@h...> <412E46BA.4040602@d...>
• User-agent: Internet Messaging Program (IMP) 3.2.2 / FreeBSD-4.8

Jonathan,

This application 'addressing' is a great example.  Now - notice that there are
about 207 postal authorities worldwide - and that each have about 5 address
formats - depending on price (bulk mail), delivery and location = so that gives
us about 1,000.  The UPU and OASIS CIQ have done excellent work on all this. 
This provides a great foundation to provide CAM templates that can
automagically sort out address format given context of country and delivery
type.

Unfortunately when it comes to addresses people re-invent their own wheel
instead of putting effort into a global standardized solution.

Again - this is a microcosm of the fuel driving train-wrecks every day.  'Oh -
all I need to do is create a schema - address - I know how to do one of
those'.

DW.

 Quoting Jonathan Robie <jonathan.robie@d...>:

>  >From Michael Kay:
> 
>  > The strategy (validating the user's address) assumes that
>  > you know better than your customers what constitutes a
>  > valid address. Let's face it, you don't, and you never
>  > will. A much better strategy is to let them (the user) express
>  > their address in their own terms. After all, that's what they
>  > do in old-fashioned paper correspondence, and it seems
>  > to work quite well.
> 
> In old-fashioned paper correspondence, addresses are interpreted by 
> human beings, and this is a perfectly fine strategy in an application 
> that formats addresses so that they can be read by human beings.
> 
> But if I have a program that needs to be able to identify customers in a 
> given region, or that needs to be able to compute the shipping costs 
> before sending an item, then my program needs to know how to read the 
> address. I'm not asking the customer to provide an address in a format 
> that they might recognize, I'm asking the customer to provide an address 
> in a format that my program can use. In that context, even if the 
> customer finds it a little painful, I'm going to make them communicate 
> at least the basic information.
> 
> For addresses, many applications have a certain middle ground. They 
> insist on knowing the country and postal code, and perhaps street name 
> and number, but allow other information to be added in a way that the 
> program might not recognize. One more useful application of partial 
> understanding.
> 
> Jonathan
> 
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• References:
  • Fallacies of Validation, version #2
    • From: "Roger L. Costello" <costello@m...>
  • Re: Fallacies of Validation, version #2
    • From: Bryan Rasmussen <bry@i...>
  • Re: Fallacies of Validation, version #2
    • From: Jonathan Robie <jonathan.robie@d...>

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