Re: [syndication] Re: Thoughts, questions, and issues.

[zac <zac@pixelgeek.com>]

Eric Bohlman wrote:

> You keep talking about "C or Java" yet there are plenty of scripting
> environments (I already named just three of them) that are *far* easier to
> use and learn than such system programming languages, and which have
> complete XML parser support.

I think you're missing the point.

> I'm not sure what this "don't have access to" means.  All the tools I've
> mentioned are free (both in the monetary and the Stallmanian senses) and
> widely used.  

I was trying to say that people don't necessarily use the same tools that
you all do. So talking about some great whizz bang Perl parser or some
Python XML component is only really valid in a small context.

People use a lot of other languages and tools to work in XML and some (maybe
most) don't the same level of XML support that many on this list seem to
take for granted.

So in those terms they don't have access to them. If a person doesn't use
Perl (which I don't) then the easy availability of Perl based XML parsers is
a moot point.

>As for not wanting to be bothered with learning namespaces,
> that's a rather short-sighted attitude, since a little learning up front
> can result in a big reduction in repetitive work down the line.

I don't believe I ever said this.

> I seriously hope that you aren't hack-parsing XML, because hacked parsers
> generally omit certain details

Well one does what one can with the tools at hand...which is my point.

The validity or superiority of a toolset or a method (like namespaces) is,
at a certain level, only valid if the people doing the development work have
access to the same level of tools.

This is almost never the case so making format decisions based on this type
of assumption is, to my mind,  non-optimal.


-- 

The word good has many meanings. For example, if a man were to shoot his
grandmother at a range of five hundred yards, I should call him a good shot,
but not  necessarily a good man

                   
J.G. Chesterton 



email: zac@pixelgeek.com
web: http://www.pixelgeek.com/