Re: Giving up on XML

[quills -at- airmail -dot- net]

At 8:33 PM -0700 3/13/07, Gene Kim-Eng wrote:
>This is something that has thus far eluded even the best commercial
>developers.  Except in expensive, turn-key solutions, XML is really
>still "not-ready-for-primetime," in much the same way as Interleaf
>was back in the day when it only came bundled with a workstation.
>One of these days someone is going to come along with an XML
>app that imports source from MS Word or FM and automatically
>generates all the DTDs and other "stuff" required to do XML, much
>as programs like RoboHelp and Dreamweaver have made it largely
>unnecessary to tinker with the underpinnings of online help and
>websites.  Until then, XML will continue to be largely the domain
>of big companies.
>
>Gene Kim-Eng
>
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: <siliconwriter -at- comcast -dot- net>
>
>>  If any of you fellow tech writers who actually UNDERSTANDS
>>  XML ever gets around to documenting it so that technically
>>  savvy but non-programmer audiences can understand and/or use
>  > it, I will be very grateful.

I beg to differ Gene, what you are hoping for will never occur. XML 
is structured, and by its very definition cannot import an 
unstructured document (Word, and even FM) and create a DTD. It may 
attempt to do so, but I doubt it would work. It certainly wouldn't 
work with an unstructured, and by most usages, nonstyle formatted 
Word document.

You have to have a structure first, then you can import a document 
and structure it. Much as you import a plain text file and format it.

Structure and formatting have a similarity in that formatting gives 
us visual structure, though it doesn't have the rules to determine if 
certain formatting is valid in any circumstance.

Scott
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