- From: Peter Murray-Rust <Peter@ursus.demon.co.uk>
- Date: Mon, 10 Feb 1997 23:23:58 GMT
- To: w3c-sgml-wg@w3.org
In message <libSDtMail.9702101400.10360.bsmith@providence/providence> Bill Smith writes:
[...]
>
> If we are going to go down this path, let's not call this "ball of stuff"
> a document. An object (WebObject) might be a better moniker since we should
^^^^^^^^^
I think this is an excellent term and it certainly describes how I use XML
documents. I don't know enough about objects to know whether we are taking
too simple view, as we have state and inheritance to consider.
> include behavior as well as appearance in the ball.
>
> My personal preference would be to include references to behavior (code)
> and appearance (style sheets). Without that separation reuse is difficult
> and object management is seriously impaired.
I think this is a very useful distinction, which will also help when it comes
to considering style sheets.
If the term WebObject is acceptable for some or all XML documents then it
is a very useful way of reaching out to the wider community. 'Objects' and
'CORBA' are the current buzzwords although a lot of people naively think
that 'CORBA' will solve their problems. It won't - they have to build
IDLs (Interface Definition Language) on top of it. Again I may be
simplistic, but for my problems I see DTDs as providing a large part of
an IDL, so that by using XML you are making life much easier for object
interoperability.
P.
--
Peter Murray-Rust, (domestic net connection)
Virtual School of Molecular Sciences, Nottingham University, UK
http://www.ccc.nottingham.ac.uk/~pazpmr/
Received on Monday, 10 February 1997 18:33:51 UTC