XML 2040
Markup UK London
June 7-9, 2019
Jirka Kosek
XML had 21st birthday
adult technology
make sure that XML will be still around to face middle-age crisis
XML strengths
excels in document and publishing scenarios
mature ecosystem
validation: Schematron, RELAX NG, W3C XML Schema 1.1
transformation: XSLT 3.0
storage/querying: NXML DB, XQuery 3.0
editing: plenty of visual editors
XML failures
has been used as a hammer for solving tasks that could be better handled with different tools
many XML formats/applications were over-engineered and too complex
Web Services, Office Open XML, …
XML is out of fashion
Next 21 years
ecosystem maintenance
education
absorbing and supporting new technologies
community
Maintaining ecosystem
ecosystem = standards and tools
Standards
for now almost no new standards are being developed
W3C closed all XML related working groups
ISO/IEC is maintaining Schematron and few vocabularies (OOXML, ODF) but activity is low
OASIS is maintaining few vocabularies (e.g. DocBook, DITA, UBL)
Do we need SDO?
not necessarily
technical infrastructure provided by services like GitHub/GitLab is sufficient when combined with mailing list, IRC, …
teleconferences can be now done for free
F2F meetings are still important and can be collocated with XML conferences
best practices should be kept
freely available specifications
at least two interoperable implementations
support I18N, A11Y
IPR?
XML Prague meetings
55 days in 12 years
2019: XProc 2 days
2018: XProc 2 days
2017: XProc 2 days + XSLT 3 days
2016: XProc 1 day + XSLT 3 days
2015: joint XSLT/XQuery 3 days + XSLT 2 days
2014: XSLT 4 days + joint XSLT/XQuery 3 days
2013: XQuery 2 days + XSLT 5 days
2012: XSLT 5 days
2011: XSLT 5 days
2010: XSLT 5 days
2009: SC34 5 days
2008: XSLT 3 days
XML 2020 × XML 2000
| XML 2000 | XML 2020 |
|---|---|
XSLT 1.0 | XSLT 3.0 |
XPath 1.0 | XPath 3.1 |
DTD & XSD 1.0 | XSD 1.1 & RELAX NG |
Schematron + XPath 1.0 | Schematron + XSLT 2.0 |
DOM | XOM, JDOM, XDocument |
XML stored as CLOB + hammer | Native XML DB + XQuery, XMLType in SQL |
Ant, make, sh | XProc 3.0 |
Tools
open-source vs commercial
long term maintenance of OSS is difficult
many current XML components and tools are 20 years old
many tools are not making progress because original authors lost interest in XML
volunteer approach can work on smaller projects that need low-volume maintenance
anything bigger needs some sort of funding
Education
make sure that developers know what XML is and how to process it
XML is not always the best solution but should be used when it is best solution
Are developers stupid or unaware?
{
...
"components": [
{
"role": "title",
"text": "Article title"
},
{
"role": "body",
"text": "First paragraph."
},
{
"role": "body",
"text": "Second paragraph."
}
],
...
}XML is out of fashion
books
many XML books has been published in 2000s
no book covering XSLT 3.0
only one book about XQuery 3.0
universities
XML is not mandatory subject in many computer science and software engineering curriculums
on-line courses
Action plan
show others how XML can help them (where appropriate)
integrate XML with a new technologies
push for XML 2020
long term maintenance of key assets
Community
there is very nice community of people around XML
regular meetings are important
sharing new ideas, learning from others
Balisage, Markup UK, XML Prague, ?
we shouldn’t be tribe living on isolated island
each individual should suggest using XML if he/she sees that wrong technology is used
friendly advice and working example work best
report bugs in XML tools, improve documentation, …
Submit, Submit, Submit!
without presentations there will be no conferences
without meeting together community will deteriorate
Integrate with a reality around us
HTML5 is the most used publication format and should be first class citizen
HTML5 input should be an alternative for XML in the whole ecosystem
same HTML5 parsing algorithm as in browsers should be used
it should work by default without need for extensions
fn:parse-html()in XPath instead ofsaxon:parse-html()loadHTML()orparseHTML()in all XML APIsHTML should be allowed as a primary source for all tools (XSLT, validation, …)
integrate JSON as seamlessly as possible
XPath 3.1/XSLT 3.0 support JSON processing
XProc 3.0 is on the way
accept JavaScript
currently it is the most widespread langauge
yet XML support in JavaScript is poor
Push for XML 2020
it is pretty easy to use the latest tools on your own projects
enterprise systems tend to be very conservative
ask you supplier to provide XSLT 2.0/XSLT 3.0 support
relying on XML 2000 tools is one of things that added to a bad XML reputation
Way to XML 2040
currently we are fine
but in 10, 15, 20 years?
maintenance of web sites where standards are hosted
hosting for community projects like EXSLT, EXPath
maintenance of key software components (security fixes, support for new versions of OS, JDK, …)
XML Foundation
non-profit organization might be needed in future
organization that outlives individual involvement and interest in XML
pay for domains and hosting
funding maintenance of key software components
See you at XML Prague
February 13–15, 2020
CFP and registration will be opened during September