- From: Paul Prescod <papresco@calum.csclub.uwaterloo.ca>
- Date: Fri, 20 Sep 1996 15:57:09 -0400
- To: w3c-sgml-wg@w3.org
At 09:53 AM 9/20/96 -0500, Len Bullard wrote: >Paul Prescod wrote: >> >> >We needn't worry about XML-only editors or >> >dedicated XML browsers because there won't be any. > >Not true. Actually, I didn't write that. I wrote: >> "We can't _depend_ on XML-only >> editors or dedicated XML browsers because there MAY NOT be any." (especially >> in the short term) But that's just a minor attribution mistake. >I don't wish to spawn a new thread or divert the working >group from its scheduled tasks. But we can get overfocused >quickly on HTML and the existing Web and the poverty >of Joe Homepage. > >The Web is not the Internet. The Web is not the Internet, but this project is being conducted under the auspices of the World Wide Web Consortium with the mandate of creating a standard for the Web: "The goal is to enable future Web user agents to receive and process generic SGML in the way that they are now able to receive and process HTML. As in the case of HTML, the implementation of SGML on the Web will require attention not just to structure and content (the domain of SGML per se) but also to link semantics and display semantics." http://www.w3.org/pub/WWW/MarkUp/SGML/Activity I support this focus on Web user agents (and those that create document for them) because SGML and SGML tools already do a great job in non-Web domains. I can build incredible query systems using OpenText tools. I can do fantastic transformations using Jade or OmniMark. I can convert SGML into hundreds of formats with hundreds of different tools. I could build an entirely new SGML tool within a few days of downloading SP. They only thing I _CANNOT_ do (that I want to) is to put a generically marked up document on my web site such that a largish percentage of the online world can read it without an expensive, data-destroying conversion to HTML. If XML solves that problem I will consider it an unqualified success. Paul Prescod
Received on Friday, 20 September 1996 16:02:12 UTC