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RE: Some Questions on XML and XML Processing

• To: "'Ram Menon'" <menon_dev@h...>,<xml-dev@l...>
• Subject: RE: Some Questions on XML and XML Processing
• From: "Michael Kay" <michael.h.kay@n...>
• Date: Fri, 9 Apr 2004 13:14:36 +0100
• In-reply-to: <BAY15-F52nW0kKIBXEH00061fea@h...>
• Thread-index: AcQeFifb/RD4ajbxTiCeHXSYTCDYBgAFSuVg

> These questions maybe looking odd.... but just curious..
> 1) Is the way XML is written[strctured, tree fashion] just 
> because of the 
> structured nature of the data it represents? Why was this mode of 
> representing a document chosen in first place?

Documents are naturally hierarchic: they have been so for thousands of
years.

The actual angle-bracket syntax is a product of the limited character
repertoires (48 characters?) of the 1960s.
> 
> 2) XML is so verbose that it cannot be easily interpreted by a human 
> audience.
> Why is it that there aren't two versions of an XML document - 
> a "direct" 
> human readable representation of the XML content [ other than 
> using XSLT and 
> making it readable], and another representation for 
> processing it, which is 
> compact and available for fast processing ?

A great deal of the success of XML is due to the fact that it found a
compromise representation which is reasonably suitable for both these roles.
> 
> 3) Why is it that parsing an XML file leads to only a single 
> XML Document?

Because the concept of an element is adequate to represent all hierarchical
subdivisions, you only need a different concept (the document) at the top
level (and arguably, you don't even need it there).

Michael Kay

• References:
  • Some Questions on XML and XML Processing
    • From: "Ram Menon" <menon_dev@h...>

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