[SCL] Re: some explanation

[Murray Altheim]

John F. Sowa wrote:
> Ed,
> 
> Thanks for the comments.  I basically agree.
> 
> And while we're talking about translating logic
> to XML form, I would like to quote a passage
> by Tim Bray, one of the chief developers and
> proponents of XML who also wrote one of the
> early tutorials on RDF back in 1998.
> 
> Although Tim strongly supports XML, he is decidedly
> lukewarm about RDF syntax, and I strongly agree
> with him.  As I said before, there are many good
> applications for XML, but please note what Tim has
> to say at the end of the excerpt below:
[...]

John,

I might note that so far as I understand from talking with Pat,
the syntax we're proposing for XCL is XML-based but not RDF/XML-
based, "RDF/XML" meaning the XML serialization of RDF -- the one
most people think of when they think "RDF." The proposed syntax
for XCL is of the former variety:  XML-style computer markup, and
is the kind of XML markup that Tim Bray would consider readable.
I think Tim and I see pretty much eye-to-eye on what constitutes
readable XML. If someone wants to convert XCL to an RDF/XML
syntax, I suggest someone create an XSLT stylesheet to do that.
It would be relatively straightforward. It's not something I'm
interested in doing.

Some people have criticized my particular design style as being
verbose; the reason for the verbosity is partly readability.
With no criticism intended, you can see the difference between
my style and say, Steve Newcomb's SGML style in looking at the
SGML DTDs for ISO 13250 Topic Maps and the XTM 1.0 syntax. I
can't claim sole credit for the latter (it was a team effort),
but the element naming conventions are my style, i.e., no
short little element names, no abbreviations. XCL is actually
shorter than I'd normally make it, using 'pred' instead of
'predicate', but it's pretty readable. You can see a very early,
strawman draft at:

      http://purl.org/xcl/

which (Pat correct me if I'm wrong) is being used as a rough
basis for the current XCL syntax. (And yes, I've got the PURL
domain for XCL so at some point we can point it to the final
online specification...)

And to reiterate, it's not expected that people will hand-write
in XML. It's a serialization syntax for machine-to-machine
interchange. Being "readable" doesn't mean people have to
read it, or write it. But it's good when you *can* read it,
whereas I agree with Tim -- I look at RDF markup and both my
eyes and brain just glaze over. Some people religiously love
it. To each their own.

I don't enter into this conversation with any intention of
defending XML against other forms of markup; that argument is
silly to continue. The market is currently XML. There is no
demonstrable "backlash" against it, and universities and
training centers are *adding* courses in XML markup, not
removing them. XML is still very much nearer the beginning of
its lifecycle than the end. If there is to be a serialization
syntax for XCL, it might include other markup forms, but if
anyone wants to be taken seriously by both the development and
Web communities (which the W3C represents a *portion* of), it's
waaaay past time to be arguing about syntax and just deliver
what is necessary to gain traction amongst the target audience.
XCL can then take its place amongst other SGML-based ISO
standards, something long overdue.

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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