[jdom-interest] delicate balance?

[Patrick Dowler]

On Tue, 01 Aug 2000, you wrote:
> At 07:24 AM 8/1/00 -0700, Joseph Bowbeer wrote:
> >One thing I've noticed as I follow this list: as everyone becomes
> >more familiar with the intricacies of XML, they "raise" the bar
> >for what passes as small, simple and intuitive.
> 
> I'm afraid that seems to happen to _every_ XML project that deals with XML
> generically, as more than a particular XML vocabulary.
> 
> The only way I know to avoid it is to work with a subset of XML, but that
> never seems to go over very well with a large number of developers.

It can be done if the base classes only support the common stuff and
then subclasses implement the fancy stuff. For most people handling
web stuff, config files, etc, I expect Document, Element, and Attribute
is all they need. An extension could add support for Comment,
ProcessingInstruction, NameSpace (in the Document only), etc. A
third level could let NameSpace go anywhere and add Entity, for example.

Something between the first two probably corresponds with Common XML.

If each level is in a separate JAR and you use factory pattern in the 
parser/adaptor, you're in business. If JDOM has one design style I
disagree with, it is in not using inheritance enough to spread out the
complexity.

--

Patrick Dowler
Canadian Astronomy Data Centre