Re: [relax-ng-comment] Abbreviated compact syntax (Re: Compact syntaxis not compact enough. Why?)

["Paul T (spk)" <paul@pault.com>]

----- Original Message -----
From: "David Rosenborg" <david.rosenborg@pantor.com>
To: "Paul T (spk)" <paul@pault.com>; <relax-ng-comment@lists.oasis-open.org>
Sent: Saturday, September 14, 2002 9:31 AM
Subject: Re: [relax-ng-comment] Abbreviated compact syntax (Re: Compact
syntax is not compact enough. Why?)


> > > element foo { } would be abbreviated as <foo> { }
> >
> > why not just
> >
> > foo {}
> >
>
> In my opinion it is too visually close to a reference to a named
> pattern which is just a name without any following curly braces.

Some languages think that  explicit type roadsigns
are good, some languages think that explicit
type roadsigns are better to be eliminated.

$var and @array in Perl
var and array in Python.

I think that's the issue of taste. I just like Python's take
more than I like Perl's take.

> Also I think the brackets help when you are writing
> more complex name classes like for example <*> or <* - foo:*>

I see no problem with this one.  I mean that historically
( shell, regexprs e t.c,  e t.c. ) when the identifier
contains some  special characters - it is acceptable
to use another special characters to avoid the
possible collision.

Which translates into

Let <*> be written as <*> , but not ask for
foo { } to be *always* written as <foo> {}

On another hand - this is minor.  I was not aware
of complex name classes in Relax NG,
that means that I'm not really against
your notation AS-IS  -  with <always> {}.

I think it is very close to Relax NG spirit,
and is definitely better, than the current one.

Rgds.Paul.