Inheritance in XML [^*]

[James K. Tauber]

> Well, here I am off being the theorist again.

Mind if I join you :-)

> Just like you, I use semantics and meaning interchangably
> also (at least I
> think I do). If you've taught an XML course recently, I'll
> bet you find
> yourself saying: "this syntax *means* that..." (e.g. "The
> start tag means
> that an element has begun.")

That's right. XML, as a language, has semantics, syntax and also
presentation. I would suggest all languages do.

But you are right about different levels. We need to be careful whether we
are talking about XML as a language or XML documents. The latter express
principally syntax which is then associated with semantics (in schemata,
which can also say something about syntax) and with presentation and
behaviour (in stylesheets, or as I prefer to call them, behaviour sheets).

James

--
James Tauber / jtauber at jtauber.com
Perth, Western Australia
XML Pages: http://www.jtauber.com/xml/


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