Re: [relax-ng] Updated resources on the RELAX NG pages

[Michael Smith <smith@xml-doc.org>]

MURATA Makoto <EB2M-MRT@asahi-net.or.jp> writes:

> Norman Walsh wrote:
> 
> > I updated the RELAX NG pages with new and updated resources.
> 
> I would propose to add links to James' non-XML syntax,
> Kawaguchi-san's syntax, and my shorthand for mimicking inheritance
> (http://www.asahi-net.or.jp/~eb2m-mrt/oo.html).

I haven't looked much yet at Kawaguchi-san's syntax or the inheritance
shorthand, but I've experimented with James' non-XML syntax and have
to say I think a lot of people getting started with RELAX NG --
especially people already accustomed to working with DTD syntax (i.e.
everybody) -- are going to find it to be a great way to write their
RELAX NG grammars (at least their initial ones). It really gives you a
much more readable view of your pattern definitions.

But maybe the non-XML syntax example[1] for RELAX NG should be
updated. It seems like it's out of sync with the RELAX NG XML schema
in appendix A of the current spec, and it doesn't actually fully
express some of the named-pattern layers in the XML version in the
spec -- for example, there's no "combine-att" pattern in the non-XML
syntax version, only the pattern for the <combine> element itself.

And FWIW, I think people will find it cumbersome to always have to
refer to the syntax as "non-XML syntax for RELAX NG" to be clear what
they mean. If it were to be given some arbitrary shorter name -- "NX
syntax" or whatever -- it sure would make it a lot easier to refer to.

One more thing: I realize annotations can't be represented using the
non-XML syntax, but is there any way the Rngnx conversion tool could
support some kind of extra processing step that would let you specify
attribute defaults in a separate file or something, and have them
automatically added to the generated RELAX NG XML schema -- instead of
needing to manually add them to the schema after it's generated?

[1] http://www.thaiopensource.com/relaxng/nonxml/relaxng.rngnx.txt