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why XML?

• From: "Simon St.Laurent" <simonstl@simonstl.com>
• To: "xml-dev@lists.xml.org" <xml-dev@lists.xml.org>
• Date: Sun, 24 Mar 2013 09:21:11 -0400

The reasons I occasionally recommend XML to people include:

* Mixed content - ignored by too many formats

* Extra layer of metadata - attributes can be incredibly powerful

* Many options for schemas - no schema, RELAX NG, W3C XML Schema, 
Examplotron, etc.

* Other people are doing it - if you're stuck, you're stuck.

* Tools - I've written my most recent books in Asciidoc, but the tools 
underneath all speak DocBook.  It's an easy conversion between ecosystems...

The only other reason I recommend it these days is a fondness for angle 
brackets, which I sometimes find in folks who've spent their last few 
decades in HTML.

I'm sure I'm forgetting something, but if those don't matter to 
developers, I'd much rather they use something else.

Otherwise, they'll spend a lot of time cursing XML, and worse, will pile 
extra crap (yes, I'm looking at Namespaces and W3C XML Schema) into XML 
to try to rebuild it in their own image.

XML has suffered enough.

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

• Follow-Ups:
  • Re: why XML?
    • From: James Fuller <james.fuller.2007@gmail.com>