Role of XML-DEV (was Re: XML-APP and XML-NEW)

[Peter Murray-Rust]

At 04:24 04/10/98 -0700, Don Park wrote:
>Peter,
>
>It was never my intention to diffuse or divert the concentration of talents
>here.  It was my intention to avoid eventual dilution to come.  I don't know

I agree - and I understood your motives. I wanted to make sure that the
discussion didn't go off in wrong directions. Making a firm statement at
the start is usually the best way :-)

>about you but I can not see XML being accepted by all the relevant
>industries without having a huge pool of XML-aware engineers numbering
>50,000 or more.  Whether the XML-DEV hardware can scale up to handle such

Agreed. The main problem is training, right :-) [We are actively think
about how to address that from Nottingham.]

>number or not, it is ultimately unavoidable that the quality of XML-DEV will
>be reduced as the result of wider and wilder populous.

I think it's the liveware that is the main concern (i.e. HenryR). For
example, whenever I post at w/e I get multiple copies of announcement from
some braindead gateway, so I get 20 unwanted copies of garbage. For Henry
that is much worse.

The second area where scale hits is simply the volume of postings. We are
up to >800 last month - and these are all of high quality. I read almost
all for impact, but don't read all in detail (i.e. I don't work through the
logic of AFs, topic maps, pernicious mixed content, 
how to run MSXML, etc.). We have the current differentiation:
	- OASIS, xml.com for current news. If I want to find out whether something
has been announced I look there
	- FAQs for newbies ('what is a DDT" (sic))
	- various specialist resources on home pages (SAX, James Tauber, James
Clark, Steve Pepper etc.)
	- XSL, RDF, DOM have their own lists
	- XML-L for general discussion and announcements. We have never formally
coordinated this but there seems to be enough difference that XML-L and
XML-DEV have different roles.
	- comp.text.xml for whatever people want

>
>Perhaps I am seeing too far down the road or just seeing things.  I see

No. Many of us have similar vision.

>XML-DEV taking up a role more important than even W3C and would very much
>like to protect it as much as possible by finding release to those who feel
>it should change.  My applogies if I stepped on your toe with my bulldozer.

Thanks for the compliment :-)

I think the WWW finds its own solutions. There is evolution - birth,
copulation, death - of newsgroups, lists, FAQs, sites, etc. Too many
solutions too early lead to diffusion and often atrophy. I have often seen
a fruitful discussion on a group stooped by the suggestion that it should
move to a new thread - the same thing happens with lists. XML-L took a long
while to get off the ground but now seems to flourish qualitatively and
qualitatively.

	P.


Peter Murray-Rust, Director Virtual School of Molecular Sciences, domestic
net connection
VSMS http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/vsms, Virtual Hyperglossary
http://www.venus.co.uk/vhg

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