[XML-DEV Mailing List Archive Home] [By Thread] [By Date] [Recent Entries] [Reply To This Message]

Re: Vocabulary Combination

• To: xml-dev@l...
• Subject: Re: Vocabulary Combination
• From: Arjun Ray <aray@n...>
• Date: Thu, 29 May 2003 07:08:28 +0000
• In-reply-to: <3ED5B096.9080102@t...>
• References: <ab7bdvs3gol4j4trlefsiq6g4bfbaou70f@4...> <3ED5B096.9080102@t...>

Tim Bray <tbray@t...> wrote:
| Arjun Ray wrote:

|> it is written: "The only reason namespaces exist, once again, is to give
|> elements and attributes programmer-friendly names that will be unique
|> across the whole Internet."
| 
| Don't be silly.  Why would you want names that are unique on a wide 
| scale if you weren't going to be combining vocabularies?

*I* don't want them.  In fact, I don't even need them.  (All I'd need is
unique names for vocabularies, the good ol' PUBLIC id concept.)  I'm just
curious about a pretty common delusion about the problem.  

| Interesting thought experiment.  Why did you leave the <h:head><h:title> 
| construct out of the HTML view?

Editing accident, sorry.

| Upon reflection, I'm not convinced that this "views" approach is useful.

I find it very useful.
 
| Merely subtracting any of the markup vocabularies is almost never apt 
| the right thing to do. 

That's ridiculous.  That would make you hostage to anyone who stuck in a
namespace/vocabulary that you had no clue about.  To announce, in instance
markup, that a vocabulary is in play is to allow for the possibility of
*partial* understanding - which happens to include the possibility of "all
I need to know anyway".  

| If what you're trying to do is display this, 

I was careful to leave specific purposes out.  Why have generalized markup
if all w're supposed to be interested in is specific purposes and no
others?  

|> If this is acceptable, then my question is: What is the decision procedure
|> by which a generic parser-level filter could generate these views, if it's
|> to take namespaced names as a guide?
| 
| Totally application-dependent, I'd think.  It doesn't seem likely that 
| "generic parser-level filter" is a very useful construct.

You just found one yourself, with the RDBMS loader application.

| > "It can't be done" is an acceptable answer, btw.
| 
| In the general case, it can't be done.  The namespaces don't give you 
| enough information. 

Right.  Namespaces are neither necessary nor sufficient for the general
problem of vocabulary combination.

As we knew a long time ago.

• Follow-Ups:
  • Re: Vocabulary Combination
    • From: "Rick Jelliffe" <ricko@a...>

• References:
  • Vocabulary Combination
    • From: Arjun Ray <aray@n...>
  • Re: Vocabulary Combination
    • From: Tim Bray <tbray@t...>

• Prev by Date: Re: Vocabulary Combination
• Next by Date: RE: XML Schema and XPointer
• Previous by thread: Re: Vocabulary Combination
• Next by thread: Re: Vocabulary Combination
• Index(es):
  • Date
  • Thread