SAX, Java, and Namespaces (was Re: Restricted Namespaces for XML)

[Simon St.Laurent]

At 07:37 AM 2/5/99 +0000, hpyle at agora.co.uk wrote:
>Can I ask for some "average user" stuff here?  Now that the namespace
>arguments have been rounded up a few times.
>
>Although James Clarks' page does explain the state of affairs very clearly,
>it's still talking to the wrong people.  What I & my other
>average-developer colleagues need is more like a "cookbook".  Not the
>intricacies of why flour plus butter behave so strangely;  we need to know
>how to roll the pastry out.

I've been attempting to cover namespaces intelligibly in my latest books,
though none of them have appeared yet.  Given the controversy, it's not
surprising that most 'explanations' are directed at the weirdness and not
the simplicity.  I may give it a crack and attempt to post a tutorial when
I finish these last two books...

>Current interest in XML - in the absence of many standardised industry DTDs
>- means there's a pressing need to explain how to design sensible XML
>structures.  Whilst there are plenty of XML examples appearing on the Web,
>few of them are well-designed (my pet peeve: people coding a date as
>"2/21/99").  Namespaces seem to be an essential solution to two problems
>encountered when designing XML stuctures:
>- how can I distinguish my tags from everyone else's, to avoid confusion
>(eg: "<my:pastry/>");
>- how can I use a common repository of meaningful tags at the same time
>(eg: "<frozen:pastry><my:sauce
>iso:litres_quantity="0.5"/></frozen:pastry>")
>With a few examples.  Finally, we need directions to the local pizza
>house...

I'd love to see a 'good examples and best practices'-oriented site for XML,
but haven't found one yet, though there are pieces everywhere.  David
Megginson and Rick Jelliffe's books are close, but both are pre-namespaces
as well.

Now, about that pizza house...
Simon St.Laurent
XML: A Primer / Building XML Applications (March)
Sharing Bandwidth / Cookies
http://www.simonstl.com

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