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Re: XML-appropriate editing data structures

• To: Amelia A Lewis <amyzing@t...>
• Subject: Re: XML-appropriate editing data structures
• From: Henrik Martensson <henrik.martensson@b...>
• Date: Fri, 09 Apr 2004 17:08:37 +0200
• Cc: XML Developer List <xml-dev@l...>
• In-reply-to: <20040408201446.53abe410.amyzing@t...>
• References: <000601c41cf4$0e7fa1e0$6800a8c0@bagpeddlerjlake> <407491E5.4080101@w...> <4074B416.1030807@o...> <p0601020bbc9ac4a5288f@[192.168.254.88]> <4075451B.9050802@c...> <p06010215bc9b37ad2f56@[192.168.254.88]> <4075986D.9080507@o...> <p0601021cbc9b8be6f925@[192.168.254.88]> <011a01c41dc1$2cd8b5f0$6403a8c0@ARIMATHEA> <20040408201446.53abe410.amyzing@t...>

On Fri, 2004-04-09 at 02:14, Amelia A Lewis wrote:

> helpful.  Much the same is true of over-helpful XML editors (and is the
> main reason I've had trouble using them (this is our return from tangent,
> please note, aren't I being good?)): <element attribute="value"="" >text
> content</element></element> is fairly messed up.  Leave me alone when I'm

I do agree that something like that would be annoying. But I would not
consider an editor that allows malformed tags like that to be a real XML
editor at all. It is a text editor with XML syntax highlighting, which
is a different thing. (Just as a text editor with RTF or MIF
highlighting would not be a word processor.)


> typing.  Give me a key to tap on if I need help.  *However*, several of my
> colleagues absolutely cannot comprehend this attitude, and profess
> themselves unable to survive without automatic code-completion sorts of
> facilities (most of them type slow, too, she sneered).

My favourite XML editor has code completion, but creating a malformed or
otherwise messed up tag is impossible. The code completion is very
customizable. For one thing, inserting an element may trigger a macro
that does just about anything I want it to do. I certainly don't want to
be without it.

For example, When I insert a list, the autocompletion feature inserts a
list with an introductory paragraph, followed by a list item, then moves
the cursor back to the paragraph. When I insert an image link, I get an
image dialog. When I insert a cross-reference or other hyperlink, I get
a hyperlink dialog that allows me to search for the target element in
the current or other documents. (The latter dialog I wrote myself.)

And none of this is slow, unless the document is quite large.

/Henrik

• Follow-Ups:
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• References:
  • Converting xml to csv with xslt
    • From: "Jerry Lake" <jerry@b...>
  • Re: Converting xml to csv with xslt
    • From: Mike Fitzgerald <mikefz@w...>
  • XML-appropriate editing data structures
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  • Re: XML-appropriate editing data structures
    • From: Elliotte Rusty Harold <elharo@m...>
  • Re: XML-appropriate editing data structures
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  • Re: XML-appropriate editing data structures
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  • Re: XML-appropriate editing data structures
    • From: "Jeff Rafter" <lists@j...>
  • Re: XML-appropriate editing data structures
    • From: Amelia A Lewis <amyzing@t...>

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