is this a quine ?

[Michael Kay]

> yes I understand this ... but was wondering why ?
> 
> Is this a default result of behavior defined by the 
> specification or is it left to implementator to decide upon ?
> 
> being a bit lazy, mainly due to the fact that to answer this 
> question I think I need to trawl through 5-6 specs.

The specification states that the result of the query is a sequence of three
strings.

It doesn't say how a sequence of three strings should be displayed on the
screen.

It does define a method for serializing any value, and Saxon chooses to use
this method by default. But there are other ways, for example try the -wrap
option. Or if you use the Java API, you can get back an Iterator that
returns the three strings.

Michael Kay
http://www.saxonica.com/