RE: [DM] BEA_006

Daniela, can I ask you to step into the front line (by which I mean the
xsl-list) to defend the backwards incompatibilities we have already
introduced? I can tell you it's not much fun, and sometimes I feel I'm
the only member of either WG who is prepared to stand there and be shot
at. Users are complaining bitterly about tiny incompatibilities we have
introduced, and this is certainly not the time to introduce more. They
are right to be concerned: they have investments to protect that run to
hundreds of thousands of lines of code.

The data model document is a freestanding document but it is designed to
be backwards compatible with the XPath 1.0 data model. It has to be, if
the language itself is going to be backwards compatible. As far as XSLT
2.0 and XPath 2.0 are concerned, we are not in a green-field situation
and we have to accept these constraints.

Michael Kay

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Daniela Florescu [mailto:danielaf@bea.com] 
> Sent: 16 February 2004 22:56
> To: Michael Kay
> Cc: public-qt-comments@w3.org
> Subject: Re: [DM] BEA_006
> 
> 
> Michael,
> 
> I am not sure I understand the statement below.
> The XML Data Model is a brand new specification and I see no 
> reason why we cannot design it in the optimal way.
> 
> The fact that we have a Data Model that is inconsistent with 
> the Infoset will cause so much damage to vendors and 
> customers. Hence, any deviation from the Infoset has to be 
> seriously justified, and this doesn't seem to be a serious 
> justification to me.
> 
> Best regards,
> Dana
> 
> 
> 
> > Historically, I think the main reason XSLT 1.0 did it like 
> this was a 
> > philosophy of avoiding dynamic errors wherever possible. We 
> can argue 
> > about the merits of this philosophy (there are arguments on both 
> > sides) but there is little point, because we can't change these 
> > decisions retrospectively.
>

Received on Tuesday, 17 February 2004 09:06:49 UTC