Subject: Re: [xsl] distinguish whether variable holds string or node set From: TW <zupftom@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> Date: Mon, 14 Jun 2010 11:57:53 +0200 |
Thanks for sharing your expert insight. I must say, I'm very impressed by your activity and omnipresence all around XSL. Thanks for the great work you're doing. 2010/6/14 Michael Kay <mike@xxxxxxxxxxxx>: > >> Well, then I'd rather stick to the "adopted standard". (Why is XSLT 2 >> so badly supported?) >> > > > Poor choice of words there. No-one supports XSLT 2.0 badly; they either > support it well, or not at all. > > If you mean, why have so few people implemented XSLT 2.0, then I think you > have to ask the question "Why has company|person X not implemented XSLT 2.0" > for a number of values of X, and then see if there is any commonality in the > answers. > > For the browser vendors, I think the answer is that none of them is > particularly interested in making the first move. You don't get competitive > advantage in the browser space by being the first to support new standards. > There's a built-in inertia here that's a great drag on the industry. > > For Microsoft, the answer is that they lost interest in XSLT, largely > because they became over-enthusiastic about their own proprietary languages, > and because of various power shifts between the various internal groups > interested in XML technology. But that's me trying to read the tea-leaves: > only Microsoft can give you the inside story, and I doubt they ever will. > > For a lot of the people who produced open-source XSLT 1.0 engines, I think > you'll find that they did the 1.0 version for fun, or in a vague hope that > they might find some unspecified revenue stream as a spin-off, perhaps > having greatly underestimated the size of the task; and having done it, with > a lot of hard work, a lot of fun, a lot of lost week-ends, and no revenue, > they weren't inclined to start all over again. > > But five XSLT 2.0 engines have been shipped, or five-and-a-half if you count > Oracle, and I know of four more that are under development; if we get to the > point where there are nine separately-developed implementations then we will > have achieved far more than most programming language standards. And > although some users are still sticking to XSLT 1.0 because that's the only > thing supported in their favourite environment, a great many more have made > the shift and are very pleased with the productivity benefits that it > brings. > > Michael Kay > Saxonica
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