Another try on groves

[Don Park]

Paul,

Thanks for the excellent article.  I am starting to see the light (although
it could just be that I left the kitchen light on :).

Elements and attributes are indeed crude and cumbersome to use.  Script
languages like JavaScript relieves some of the pain but most of the work so
far has been on making HTML easier to work with and support for other
document models is sadly lacking.

I do have great hope for the XML Data Binding specification (see below for
link) which does address half of the issues you raised.  Concerns I have
with XML Data Binding specification are a) it is a Java-only solution, and
b) it doesn't exist yet.

I also agree that node references would be far easier to work with if they
behaved exactly like the referenced objects.  But then it is just
application of the Proxy design pattern with node identity requirement
thrown in.

At this point, I see the Grove concept as not something new but very old,
practical, and obvious, at least to me, described in abstract ways.  Its
very strength, general applicability, is probably the very reason why people
who understand it feel that it must be described abstractly.

I do like the Grove concept and now feel that it will have its day in the
Sun (sorry, JavaSoft then).  However, I believe the patient must feel the
pain, acutely and repeatedly, before the doctor can prescribe the cure.  DOM
will be used and then abandoned later for something better when the pain
becomes too much.

Best,

Don Park
Docuverse

References:

XML Data Binding specification:
http://www.javasoft.com/aboutJava/communityprocess/jsr/jsr_031_xmld.html



xml-dev: A list for W3C XML Developers. To post, mailto:xml-dev at ic.ac.uk
Archived as: http://www.lists.ic.ac.uk/hypermail/xml-dev/ and on CD-ROM/ISBN 981-02-3594-1
To (un)subscribe, mailto:majordomo at ic.ac.uk the following message;
(un)subscribe xml-dev
To subscribe to the digests, mailto:majordomo at ic.ac.uk the following message;
subscribe xml-dev-digest
List coordinator, Henry Rzepa (mailto:rzepa at ic.ac.uk)