> XML namespaces may be used for identifying the structure,> but many people consider that to be malpractice, since XML> namespaces do not uniquely map to a (version of a) schema.> If situations where the XML namespace is also uniquely> identifying the version of the schema, that is local> application policy, and not defined anywhere by XML>...

> I work for Fortune X00 company making stuff for other> Fortune X00 companies. Some of our stuff (circa 1.1) is> Applet. Most of our clients refuse to upgrade from 1.3.> Nor will they. Maybe we have worse than usual clients.> . OTOH, these clients still won't accept COBOL/84 code,> either.That stinks. We are still using 1.4 where I am but I...

> I think people overlook SWT. I was really excited about SWT until I actually tried it. I hate APIs that rely on huge numbers of uncategorized integer constants (or enums) which seems to be an IBM MO. Maybe things have gotten better in the last couple years but I got sick of trying to figure out which constants are valid parameters to which...

> I was converting an XML file to another XML format. XSLT> is one tool for that job. But from experience I think> XPath/XQuery code is a lot lesser than XSLT code for the> same input. That's just my opinion. Did you try XPath?I use XPath in XSLT stylesheets. I wouldn't want to use XSLT without XPath. I find the question quite odd, actually.> I...

> Personally I make my living doing Java desktop apps but> not using straight Java (that *is* crazy). The Swing> picture looks a lot better when you consider the use of a> dynamic language. So I use Monkeybars> (http://monkeybars.org) which when combined with a decent> visual designer like Netbeans means Swing gets out of your> way more than it...

> > > > I disagree with Ted Neward that developers dislike> > XSLT> > > > because it is complex. > > > You don't think XSLT is too complex?> > > Even the easiest things are confusing in XSLT.> > > > Can you give an example?> Loops are complicated, if you cannot use for-each. Then> you have to use recursion.I generally don't need loop outside of...

> I'll chime in. I wrote a Swing app a few years ago. The> level of effort required and the overall clunkiness of the> result convinced me that Java UI was just pointless. I've> revisited that app as recently as a couple years ago. It> still looks awful (I'm using standard swing components)> and feels "mushy" in terms of responsiveness.Did you...

> > Do the people using the applications care about> > desktop java? Absolutely not. They shouldn't know and> > shouldn't really care. They care about getting their> work> > done.> > That's a very good point, and there's an angle that so far> no one addressed here. I developed a Swing app for public> consumption once, and it still has dozens of...

> XSLT uses DOM and loads up the entire input XML into> memory. I worked for an insurance company where input> files were more than 20MB each. The style sheet would be> at least twice the size (or more) because XSLT is again> XML and is too verbose.I can't be sure without any details but if your XSLT is longer than the input, you probably...

I got sidetracked yesterday and forgot to point out that Ted Neward makes a fairly nonsensical argument for XML:> The goal of XML was never to be small or fast, but> still clearly simple. And, despite your personal opinion> about the ecosystem that has grown up around XML (SOAP,> WS-*, and so on), it's still fairly easy to defend the> idea that...

> > I disagree with Ted Neward that developers dislike XSLT> > because it is complex. > You don't think XSLT is too complex?> Even the easiest things are confusing in XSLT.Can you give an example?I really don't find XSLT to be very complicated and I think it's well adapted to it's intended purpose.

> Because XML documents are intended to be> self-descriptive, the Protocol Buffer format can contain> just the data, and leave the format and structure to be> enforced by the code on either side of the> producer/consumer relationship. Whether you consider this> a Good Thing or a Bad Thing probably stands as a good> indicator of whether you like...

> > I'm actually not saying that it's a good idea to make> it> > type safe. The more I think about your approach, the> more> > I like it. It's ugly but does resolve a number of> issues> > with generics.> > I prefer "Pragmatic". :-)> > Maybe time to write one of those "Pragmatic XXX" books...Pragmatic triple-X? There might be some real money in...

> map reduce is in heavy use at google. I think everyone is> surprised at how commonly map-reduce can be put into play.> I heard that it is now being used by something like 500> different programs. Probably because it is a pretty basic> distributed parallel algorithm. > > Could a library of distributed map reduce be developed for> use on...

> While James is> right that in an ideal world it would be best to bring> this knowledge to the compiler, I confess to James and> agree with Alan that after a point it's not worth it.I'm actually not saying that it's a good idea to make it type safe. The more I think about your approach, the more I like it. It's ugly but does resolve a number...