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Re: XML basics

• From: "Simon St.Laurent" <simonstl@simonstl.com>
• To: Michael Sokolov <sokolov@ifactory.com>
• Date: Tue, 01 Mar 2011 09:16:52 -0500

On 3/1/11 9:05 AM, Michael Sokolov wrote:
> Yeah, this anti-node bias has me confused, too. node() gets used in all
> kinds of XML APIs like xpath and xquery, and it seems to mean pretty
> much the same thing there, and is a useful term. I must be missing some
> subtle source of confusion?

If you come from a computing culture that starts with nodes (as opposed 
to, say, documents), you're not likely to see the source of confusion.

In my own experience, teaching actual markup instead of APIs and using 
markup terminology (element and attribute, tag, etc.) rather than API 
terminology (nodes) builds a much sounder platform for future conversation.

Then again, I've pretty much despaired at the data-centric path XML 
usage took, so I'm not surprised by the bias toward programming 
vocabulary.  I've pretty much lost this battle, but every now and then 
still think it worth poking back.

-- 
Simon St.Laurent
http://simonstl.com/

• References:
  • Re: XML basics
    • From: Joe Fawcett <joefawcett@hotmail.com>
  • Re: XML basics
    • From: Michael Sokolov <sokolov@ifactory.com>