[xsl] [ANN] EXPath: collaboratively defining XPath extensions

Subject: [xsl] [ANN] EXPath: collaboratively defining XPath extensions
From: Florent Georges <lists@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 2009 22:56:59 +0000 (GMT)
  Hi,

  In the past few months, we could hear more and more the demand
for a standardized set of extensions for XSLT and XQuery, as the
recent activity around EXSLT 2.0 and EXQuery (within which I am
involved) can tell.

  Those projects try to fulfill real-world needs, in the
tradition of EXSLT, and that's a good thing.  But as those
projects were fixing their objectives, it became clear they
overlap, as one of their goals is to provide more functionalities
through the definition of extension functions.  Why one would
want to define twice an extension function to deal with HTTP or
to handle ZIP files?

  Those facts, with the help of interesting discussions at XML
Prague, leaded to the evidence that a similar project, working at
the XPath level, would better achieve the goal of defining a set
of standardized extension functions.  In the same way the XSLT
and XQuery working groups at the W3C joined their efforts to
collaboratively define XPath 2.0, while host language-specifics
were the responsibility of each WG.

  In addition, working at the XPath level provide the ability to
implement them for other host languages, as XProc, as well for
standalone XPath implementations (for instance in Java or .Net.)

  In this idea of defining a single set of extension functions, I
am very proud to announce EXPath: http://www.expath.org/.  The
project is just born, but you can already find an HTTP module.

  If you are interested in participating in this project, if you
have ideas, or if you just want to use its functions, please join
the mailing list <http://www.expath.org/lists.html> and let us
know!

  Hope to see on the list,

--
Florent Georges
http://www.fgeorges.org/

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