[SCL] XML question

[Murray Altheim]

John F. Sowa wrote:
> Folks,
> 
> All these points illustrate one fundamental point that has
> been hammered home again and again over the past 50 years:
> 
>    There is no ideal syntax that can satisfy all requirements.
> 
> That is why we decided to define S/CL in an abstract syntax
> that could be mapped to any particular syntax anybody would
> require.
> 
> I suggest that we concentrate on a good clean syntax that
> can be easily mapped to a wide variety of notations -- and
> that we make sure that there is at least one that can
> peacefully coexist with XML.
> 
> But since the XML world was never designed to meet the
> requirements of human readability, logical deduction,
> efficient computation, and many other good things,
> we should not distort S/CL core just to make it conform
> to the XML restrictions.

John,

I agree, and I like your earlier suggestion of defining the
syntax via EBNF, since it's then relatively straightforward
a process to write a converter from the SCL to XCL and back
again. And that converter would perform all those messy con-
versions Pat and Bill are worried about. As you know, EBNF
is something I've always wanted. There are even automatic
parser generators that can create the parser directly from
the EBNF grammar.

I don't think it's necessary or even a good idea to try to
put SCL proper within XML attribute values, since SCL might
itself contain all sorts of strange (to XML) syntax features.
This is the rationale (as you say, John) behind creating an
XML syntax: to avoid worrying about such things.

Murray

......................................................................
Murray Altheim                    http://kmi.open.ac.uk/people/murray/
Knowledge Media Institute
The Open University, Milton Keynes, Bucks, MK7 6AA, UK               .

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