Why I hate XML for DSLs • Hacker News Board

Re: Why I hate XML for DSLs

#21

Post by siika2000 » Mon, Feb 21, 2011, 9:52 AM UTC

patrickg wrote: post #11

j_baker wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't doubt that you could write a DSL that someone would be productive with. But then you'd need to keep a psychiatrist on staff to make sure the people using it don't go crazy. If we're talking about a full on, general purpose language, then you might as well start them on Thorazine ahead of time. Otherwise, you risk a programmer going postal. In short, don't risk your or your coworkers' safety. Just say no to XM…

I know several people that are productive with that language without a psychiatrist. Take for example XSLT. You are saying that all XSLT programmers are mad?

Are you sure you haven't misspelled you nick when registering? I mean, g and b are like right next to each other...

Re: Why I hate XML for DSLs

#22

Post by furbearntrout » Mon, Feb 21, 2011, 11:24 AM UTC

xiongchiamiov wrote: post #20

mkramlich wrote: post #17

Most of my past experience with XML reminds of a certain saying. The one about how someone realized they had a problem and that it could be solved with XML. Then they had two problems.

Oh, not the one about how XML's like violence - more of it solves any problem?

XML is like violence. If you see too much of it early on, you will start to think it's normal. It will scar you for life.

Re: Why I hate XML for DSLs

#23

Post by patrickg » Mon, Feb 21, 2011, 3:03 PM UTC

siika2000 wrote: post #21

patrickg wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know several people that are productive with that language without a psychiatrist. Take for example XSLT. You are saying that all XSLT programmers are mad?

Are you sure you haven't misspelled you nick when registering? I mean, g and b are like right next to each other...

Who is patrickb? Why should I change my name?

[edit: ok, I get it! :) ]

Re: Why I hate XML for DSLs

#24

Post by patrickg » Mon, Feb 21, 2011, 3:06 PM UTC

j_baker wrote: post #12

patrickg wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know several people that are productive with that language without a psychiatrist. Take for example XSLT. You are saying that all XSLT programmers are mad?

Not at all. However, if they enjoy it, I'm not convinced they're sane either.

So everyone who is not mainstream is subject to not being sane? What a strange hacker attitude...

Re: Why I hate XML for DSLs

#25

Post by siika2000 » Mon, Feb 21, 2011, 3:41 PM UTC

patrickg wrote: post #23

siika2000 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you sure you haven't misspelled you nick when registering? I mean, g and b are like right next to each other...

Who is patrickb? Why should I change my name? [edit: ok, I get it! :) ]

I was trying to be funny, but failed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrick_Bateman

Re: Why I hate XML for DSLs

#26

Post by j_baker » Mon, Feb 21, 2011, 7:46 PM UTC

patrickg wrote: post #24

j_baker wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not at all. However, if they enjoy it, I'm not convinced they're sane either.

So everyone who is not mainstream is subject to not being sane? What a strange hacker attitude...

The point I'm trying to make is that while I'm sure you could make an XML-based DSL that does its job, I don't think anyone would enjoy using it over an alternate way of implementing the language. Thus, being forced to program in it would drive them insane.

Re: Why I hate XML for DSLs

#27

Post by chopin » Tue, Feb 22, 2011, 8:02 AM UTC

masklinn wrote: post #18

chopin wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Languages are mainly for humans, not for machines. XML is intended for transporting data machine to machine, not to be read and comprehended by humans. Computer languages must foster the comnprehension by (fellow) developers, this is their main task. Reloading is possible with Java as well. And even an XML-document has to be reparsed and most likely be brought into an internal representation, a task which is very sim…

> Languages are mainly for humans, not for machines. XML is intended for transporting data machine to machine, not to be read and comprehended by humans. You might want to avoid rewriting history, or at least avoid commenting on things you clearly know nothing about. XML Working Group design goal 6 (out of 10): > XML documents should be human-legible and reasonably clear. Human readability was a primary goal of the W…

> XML documents should be human-legible and reasonably clear.

Yes, that's true, as stated in http://www.w3.org/TR/2008/REC-xml-20081126/#sec-origin-goals. Nevertheless, I stand by my point that human readability does not necessarily imply easy human comprehension. For that matter I believe that the working group introduces that design goal to ease problem tracking and not to imply that xml is suitable for human to human communication (which imho should be the main design goal of computer languages). I have great respect for your mental abilities but for me its difficult to understand larger ant scripts as xml is a data container and not a control flow language.