Re: xml.apache.org charter proposal

[Fotis Jannidis <fo...@lrz.uni-muenchen.de>]

From:           	"Ted Leung" <tw...@sauria.com>
> >
> > Arved Sandstrom <Ar...@chebucto.ns.ca> wrote:
> > > Scott, what did you mean by 'a standard that is based on XML'?
> >
> > Dunno, maybe I'm marching down the wrong path there.  As I said, it was
> > only a start.

I don't think that xml.apache.org can define its charter without 
some reference to 'standards', otherwise you have to accept every 
project that somewhere uses xml or reject it on quite subjective 
grounds.

But there is no reason why we couldn't define two independent 
criteria to decide the inclusion of projects. One based on the 
'standard' argument, the other one based on a softer set of 
arguments like

- should be using xml in a central position
- should be solving a immediate need (like ant)
 etc. 

ad 'standard': Very obviously the xml.apache.org can't be based on 
finished standards, because even most of the xml 
recommendations from w3c are still in work. So we could use a 
definition like standard, that is "a proposed or finished set of rules 
which are developed and hosted by some institution like w3c, 
Oasis, or the Java Community Process". We could try to have a 
full list of all institutions we accept and vote if somebody wants to 
include a new one (I hope the word 'institution' can be used as 
broadly in English as it can in German; almost everything can be 
an institution, p.e. David Megginson can certainly be called one). 

I am not up to date with the latest developments, but as far as I 
know JDom is in the Java Community Process and TreX is now 
developed by Oasis, so both would meet the standard based 
inclusion criterium.

Fotis




> >
> > > I don't think the Ant format is a 'Standards-based' thing - but
> > > it's great to have available components that consume this and
> > > do useful work.
> >
> > Ant is a really good example to discuss.  It fits most of the criteria I
> > named.  Whether or not it's a standard could be debated, but I really
> think
> > it's on its way to becoming a defacto standard, so it fits the bill in my
> > book.
> 
> Right.  But when Ant started as a Jakarta project, there was no OASIS, W3C,
> IETF
> or any other standard (except for make).  It only became a defacto standard
> after the fact.  So if we adopted a "standards" based charter, we'd never do
> any
> development of things like Ant.  That's why I'm not excited about a charter
> that
> involves using standards as the exclusion mechanism.
> 
> > I wouldn't think Ant would be a good candidate for xml.apache.com.   Why?
> > Because it is not a "general" ML... it is for a specific purpose... it
> > could just as easily be ZXY language, if it worked as well as ant does.
> > But maybe you could say the same thing about FOs?
> >
> > As I said, maybe this is the wrong start.  Maybe we should work on what
> our
> > vision is... what is it that xml.apache.org is trying to build beyond
> > riding on the XML buzz word?
> >
> > My vision: We exist to enable clean information to be easily exchanged,
> > transformed, presented, and used in a great variety of configurations, and
> > we believe that XML is the best protocol for that information.  We want to
> > define a set of pluggable components that exchange or deal with XML
> > information sets that plug into each other using standard APIs, that are
> > very high performance, reliable, and easy to use.  These components should
> > be part of a underlying architectural orchistration that will allow them
> to
> > work together without major negotiations or breakages.  We believe that
> > these components should be vendor neutral and useable as core components
> > for all.  We believe that the best way to define this XML information
> > exchange architecture is by having both individuals and corporations
> > collaborate on the best possible infrastructure, APIs, code, testing, and
> > release cycles.  We believe that these XML information components will
> help
> > to change the world in a positive way by making knowledge and data as they
> > exist on computer networks much more powerful that they are currently.
> >
> > So that's my personal vision, and I think is the general reason why I am
> > doing what I'm doing.  Can other's articulate why they are here, and what
> > they would like to build on xml.apache.org???
> 
> Actually, what you've said there is pretty close, although it could be
> interpreted as
> "cool XML stuff".  My slant is more like this (I'm not saying we have to use
> this, I'm
> trying to explain where I'm coming from):  I want the opportunity to work
> with smart
> people on interesting problems  in the XML space, and  I want the fruits of
> my labor
> to be  available to whoever wants to use it (individual or corporation).
> The ability
> to innovate in this space is very important to me.
> 
> > Interestingly, Cocoon *does* fit into this vision, which I think is really
> > cool.
> 
> I'd be very happy if in a year or two, we had a bunch more cool projects
> like Cocoon.
> The projects that most represent innovation to me are Cocoon, Ant, Struts,
> Turbine,
> and Velocity.   Most of our (XML) current projects are building blooks for
> the really
> cool stuff.  And we haven't started on much of that yet.
> 
> My 2cents.
> 
> Ted
> 
> 
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