[XML-DEV Mailing List Archive Home] [By Thread] [By Date] [Recent Entries] [Reply To This Message] Re: Avoding a repeat of W3C XSD - was Re: Is
Michael Kay wrote: >I didn't say people should stay on because they're the only people who >understand the thing. > I didn't say you did. >I said that if you bring new people in half way, they >will bring in yet more "good ideas" and the spec will get even bigger as a >result, in fact it will grow indefinitely. You did a classic - arguing >against a point I didn't make, and failing to address the point I did make > > If your point is that if the gods depart before creation is finished, the suns of dust who follow shall never finish and the specs shall grow inifinitely, as a natural law, it is a ludicrous assertion that does not require addressing, except to reference Chicken Little. All that will happen will be a refactoring: the gods may document their compelling rationales before twilight so that the new blood (and the outside world) will understand what the justifications are. During changeover periods, the outgoing members will take extra time to make sure their POVs are understood. Corporate POVs should outlast indivual member's POVs anyway. Newbies in groups have no choice but to be idiots if decisions are not adequately documented and justified. Standards will still get made: just different ones. Everyone may trim back their "good ideas". (In any case, why is a sprinkling of two generations of "good ideas" necessarily worse than wholesale implementation all of a single long-lived generation's "good ideas"?) Specs may be factored out into frameworks and layers, dependencies will be fewer, attempts at universal solutions may be discounted in favour of more modular designs, groups may be smaller so that people can contribute in their areas of best interest (e.g. for XSD there should have been one WG for dates only, etc.) People would have a very strong impetus to get their specs finished during their term, and that its product would set up the next stage to go in their favoured direction. This would work strongly against premature standardization and encourage alternatives (even if the form of experiments which finally get standardized.) Of course the people who initiated a project might not like the way it ends up: but that is the case for many people who work in WGs for several years but not its entire life. If 2 years is too short, I am happy to substitute 2.5 years. But less than 3 or 4 :-) >Occasionally one wishes that certain individuals would retire, so that the >rest of the group can get rid of the hobby-horse that's only there because >that one person wouldn't shut up about it. But new people will bring their >own hobby-horses, so it's not really a solution. > > If everyone's hobbey-horses were equal, perhaps. The topic is how to avoid a repeat of W3C XSD. Cheers Rick Jelliffe P.S. I probably cannot respond to other points for a week or so in the forensic detail that may be polite; I am recuperating from my surgery and I have to sit in the sun on a banana farm from the next few months on doctor's orders (err, the farm and the particular fruit are not specifically indicated) and the Internet access and data rates up north in Australia is pretty frustrating.
|
PURCHASE STYLUS STUDIO ONLINE TODAY!Purchasing Stylus Studio from our online shop is Easy, Secure and Value Priced! Download The World's Best XML IDE!Accelerate XML development with our award-winning XML IDE - Download a free trial today! Subscribe in XML format
|