Re: () equivalent to () ?

On Monday 22 August 2005 13:48, Michael Kay wrote:
[...]

> It's true that the result of data(()) is (). However, systems are allowed
> to do static type checking. The static types inferred for () and data(())
> are different. So there's at least one sense in which they are not
> equivalent.

You mean that the static type of "()" is void(), while for "data()" it is 
"xdt:anyAtomicType()*"? Could you elaborate? What impact in practice does 
this difference in static types, whatever it is, have? 

>
> > However, testing this theory in practice in a host language
> > such as XSLT 2.0
> > is impossible(?) since all comparison operators returns the
> > empty sequence
> > when an operand is the empty sequence.
>
> You're talking about a new comparison operation of your own invention which
> you haven't fully defined, and which seems to differ slightly from those
> already defined in the language. You're welcome to do this. First you need
> to define what you want its semantics to be, and then you can implement it
> as a function. But so far, you haven't defined its semantics except by
> appeal to "common principles" - which you will quickly find are not as
> common as you thought.

Right, the question was ill prepared and badly put, there's not much more to 
say.


Cheers,

		Frans