Re: 'propietary languages' section -- remove it

On Jan 14, 2009, at 1:34 PM, Ian Hickson wrote:

>
> On Wed, 14 Jan 2009, Larry Masinter wrote:
>>
>> My suggestion is that the entire section be removed from the
>> specification.  The current text is political and inflammatory, and  
>> does
>> not contribute to the understanding of the text:
>>
>> | This specification is independent of the various proprietary
>> | application languages that various vendors provide, but is  
>> intended to
>> | address many of the same problems.
>> |
>> | In contrast with proprietary languages, this specification is  
>> intended
>> | to define an openly-produced, vendor-neutral language, to be
>> | implemented in a broad range of competing products, across a wide  
>> range
>> | of platforms and devices. This enables developers to write  
>> applications
>> | that are not limited to one vendor's implementation or language.
>> | Furthermore, while writing applications that target vendor-specific
>> | platforms necessarily introduces a cost that application  
>> developers and
>> | their customers or users will face if they are forced to switch (or
>> | desire to switch) to another vendor's platform, using an
>> | openly-produced and vendor neutral language means that application
>> | authors can switch vendors with little to no cost.
>
> I agree that the old text did have some unnecessarily inflammatory
> statements, but on Chris' advice, those were removed. What is  
> political
> and inflammatory about the current text? It all seems objectively  
> accurate
> to me. The reason for having this section at all is the same as all  
> the
> other introduction sections -- people often ask why we are doing  
> this and
> how this fits in with other solutions, and this is part of the answer.
>
> Pretending that vendor-specific solutions don't exist won't make  
> them go
> away. I don't understand why we would remove this section.

I don't think the text is particularly inflammatory, except perhaps by  
calling out certain vendor-specific technologies by name. However, the  
current version just explains the benefits of open standards in  
general, essentially. I think that sort of thing could go without  
saying in an open standards specification.

Regards,
Maciej

Received on Wednesday, 14 January 2009 22:35:40 UTC