Re: [xml-dev] Tim Bray on "Which Technologies Matter?"

Elliotte Rusty Harold wrote:

> These sound like new documents, not new projects. If some
> organization started marking up legislation or helicopter designs in
> SGML in 1990, and is still using that for new laws and new
> helicopters in 2002, that's not really a new use of SGML, any more
> than the latest Grisham novel is a new use of English.

The ability to use the DTD that they put so much effort into in 1990 is the payoff
that these organisations are enjoying now. Organisations _want_ to reuse their
structures - it's deeply important to them. They're quite proud to see analysis
stand the test of 10 years or more. They don't feel left behind by XML - in fact,
some of them are quite smug. Well may they be - you can't even get 10 years out of
a word processor anymore, let alone the benefits of structured data.

It's outlandish to suggest that criteria for a new project dictates that you use a
different structure - would you also maintain that data marked up against the XML
DocBook DTD cannot be considered to be a new project? Are no websites new projects,
because they just use HTML?


--
Regards,

Marcus Carr                      email:  
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Allette Systems (Australia)      www:    http://www.allette.com.au
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"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler."
       - Einstein