Re: DOCBOOK-APPS: Re: conditionalization of XML

["Eric S. Raymond" <esr@thyrsus.com>]

Daniel Veillard <veillard@redhat.com>:
>   I'm not convinced that one need acces to the DocType to conditionalize
> *processing* . And I'm definitely convinced that it's useless to try to
> add support for an unstructured processing within an XML toolkit.

The problem with not being able to see the doctype is that that means
you cannot pass it through transparently.  XSLT cannot reproduce on its
output what it can't see on its input.  That's why I gave up on XSLT -- 
because *any* stylesheet-based approach to conditionalization will have
the same problem.  

xmlif my be inelegant from a pure XML point of view, but it is
certainly not useless.  I'm using it quite effectively every time I 
render my document -- in fact it gives me important capabilities I
would not otherwise have.  Perhaps you should reconsider your
definition of "useless"?

>   I don't want to add an add-hoc unspecified unstructured processing
> to my toolkit and maintain it. Show me a more coherent request and
> I will re-evaluate it. Mind you I have work to get done too !

I don't know what you would consider a coherent request.  Do you want
a more formal specification of the behavior of the PIs?
-- 
		<a href="http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/";>Eric S. Raymond</a>