Plutarck wrote:
> I use to be really enthusiastically pro-XML just as I was getting into PHP,
> but now I've basically taken a "XML shmexXML" approach. I get the initial
> attraction, but I would think the love would fade off a bit.
>
> The key that so many people seem to forget is the best way to do HTML is
> with, *gasp*, HTML!
>
> If you just want a webpage, XML is using a canon to kill a fly. It's like
> creating classes and objects in PHP for sending text emails.
>
Agreed, but if you have a set of data that you'd like to be able to
"fairly easily" convert into multiple presentation systems (HTML, PDF
and WAP spring to mind), then taking a more structured data and
abstraction approach can pay off quite handsomely on larger projects.
>
> Sure you can do it...but why?
>
Because what you need to do might change some in the future. Yes,
use mail() all you want, but when you start needing to send attachments,
already you need a class of some sort. - Aha - I see you qualified and said
'text' attachments. OK...
>
> XML is new. Common society doesn't do well with new. They always manage to
> screw it up somehow.
>
Depends on what you mean by 'screw it up'. The notion of a commercial
internet, to me, seems to have been adopted QUITE quickly - even my
parents have coped quite well with this 'new' stuff, and they STILL
can't set their VCR clocks.
>
> XML started as an extensible markup language...that's it. That's all it was
> supposed to do! Now people are using it to query databases, and concoct
> entire search engines, and they are trying to use it to control access to
> restricted data, etc etc.
>
I don't know what you're talking about here. I've not heard of anyone using
XML to 'control access' to 'restricted data'. The XML itself IS the data.
>
> It's the same thing that happened with Java. People just aren't good with
> "new".
>
Don't lump Java in with other 'new' technology wholesale. Sun has made,
imo, a HUGE number of mistakes pushing Java out, so the
less-than-stellar adoption of Java has as much or more to do with Sun themselves
rather than people's ability to adopt to 'new' things. Again, imo.
>
> XML is nice, and for some things it's even great. But it's not the death of
> plain old HTML, just like ISDN didn't kill POTS (remember when ISDN was "the
> future of telecom"?).
>
> I fear that there are too many cooks in the kitchen on XML, all with a
> seasoning all their own that they are dead set on adding to the broth.
>
> But for me, I say let people play with their Java and XML and new fangled
> widgets. I'll take my PHP and plain-old HTML, and I'll create twice as much
> material with just as high a quality, and I won't need to spend an extra
> minute learning a bleeding-edge technology.
>
Twice as much material? Is there a contest going on? Some of us are trying
to use PHP to create advanced applications where we exchange data with
disparate parties. Having a common standard by which we can exchange
data is a necessity - XML can be that commonality in many cases.
Keep making your HTML webpages - no one is trying to convert you. Realize
2 things:
1. The impact and use of 'internet' and related technologies are much larger
than you or I alone can grasp.
2. New things can come along that don't disrupt your world - you don't need to
come down so heavily on something you don't need or use.
>
> Life's too short to spend it learning how to live it. Translation: Better to
> program than to learn yet _another_ language.
>
Go back to VIC-20 BASIC then. Things change, and eventually you need to adapt.
At one point you didn't know PHP. Why did you learn it? Why not stick
with what you were using before? Because PHP offered you benefits
you couldn't get elsewhere for the same effort. SAME thing with XML. There are
growing pains, yes, and political pissing matches between the "big boys" but
all in all it's a good idea that some of us have a use for.
:)
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