Re: Co-ordinating XSLT/XPath and XML Query, was RE: [xsl] "XSLT as a Query Language" slides available

[Francis Norton <francis at redrice dot com>]

Michael Kay wrote:
> 
> > Are there any efforts to co-ordinate XSLT/XPath 2.0 and XQL?
> 
> Yes, there are extensive efforts. If you look at the XPath 2.0 requirements,
> you will see they are produced jointly by the two groups.
> 
> http://www.w3.org/TR/2001/WD-xpath20req-20010214
> 
> There are a number of joint teams from the two areas working to devise an
> XPath 2.0 that will be usable both as a subset of XML Query and within XSLT.
> 

I must say I was really impressed by Evan Lenz's restraint when making
his presentation.

This is an important area but it would be easier to take the proposal
more seriously if the proposal took XML and XPath more seriously.

Adding the RANGE keyword to XPath [1] - to a language that has freedom
from keywords as one of its core values - is an abomination.

And the authors must be keen on manual query entry, since it appears
that the pseudo-XML element constructor [2] has been carefully designed
to break any XML-aware tool.

All in all it seems to me that XSLT with some exslt extensions would be
far better placed to build up maximum commonality than the approach
proposed so far.

Francis.

[1]	http://xmlportfolio.com/xsltuk/slides/Q2.html

[2]	http://xmlportfolio.com/xsltuk/slides/Q7.html

 XSL-List info and archive:  http://www.mulberrytech.com/xsl/xsl-list