Re: There Are No Metadocuments

At 2:00 PM 2/10/97, Bill Smith wrote:
>Terry Allen wrote:

>> Considering documents this way might clarify discussion (and then
>> again, maybe not), and it would certainly clarify explanation:
>> "An XML document can be a complex structure, including a style
>> sheet or even choice of style sheets, and some metainformation
>> about who and how it was produced, just like a Word document
>> carries its formatting and some meta along with its text, although
>> you don't see everything when you look at it in Word."
>
>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
>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.

Just as some would like to see SGML Link declaration information be separate
from "the document".  And others insist vociferously that it *must* be
part of "the document".  And others would like "the document" to be just
the SGML document element/instance.  What should and should not be part of
"the document" is a religious war.  :-(

Dave Peterson
SGMLWorks!

davep@acm.org

Received on Monday, 10 February 1997 22:52:59 UTC