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Re: ISO and the Standards Golden Hammer (was Re: You

• To: XML Developers List <xml-dev@l...>
• Subject: Re: ISO and the Standards Golden Hammer (was Re: You call that a standard?)
• From: David Megginson <dmeggin@a...>
• Date: Thu, 29 Apr 2004 13:23:29 -0400
• In-reply-to: <15725CF6AFE2F34DB8A5B4770B7334EE03F9F735@h...>
• References: <15725CF6AFE2F34DB8A5B4770B7334EE03F9F735@h...>
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Bullard, Claude L (Len) wrote:

>>The fact is that ISO never did well with computer technology, either before 
>>*or* after XML.  
> 
> The fact is that where ISO works with a technical consortium, they do quite 
> well.   They can do better.

I wonder what Len would hold out as ISO's great computer technology 
successes, leaving aside cases where they simply rubber-stamped some 
existing consortium's work (i.e. Unicode and a few others)?

We can always pretend that ISO's Great Unimplemented Standards would have 
worked better than the specs that people actually use, but without real 
field experience, who knows?  Lots of designs look good on paper but fall 
apart in the field.  For example, one ISO Standard that wasn't stillborn, 
SGML, had significant interoperability problems: many of us on this list 
once made money primarily from helping people work around them.


All the best,


David

• Follow-Ups:
  • Re: ISO and the Standards Golden Hammer (was Re: [xml-d ev] You call that a standard?)
    • From: "Ken North" <kennorth@s...>
  • RE: ISO and the Standards Golden Hammer (was Re: [xml-d ev] You call that a standard?)
    • From: "Michael Kay" <michael.h.kay@n...>

• References:
  • RE: ISO and the Standards Golden Hammer (was Re: You call that a standard?)
    • From: "Bullard, Claude L (Len)" <clbullar@i...>

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