MK:
There has been an ongoing debate about the merits of using XML syntax
versus non-XML syntax for a while now, and I don't think it's going to
go away. It promises to be one of these perennials like "elements vs
attributes".
<snip/>
I think it's going to be quite unusual to see XQuery parsers
that report
more than one syntax error in a single compile run. The grammar is not
robust enough to allow easy recovery from syntax errors, though the
introduction of semicolons as separators in the latest draft helps.
I think you are supporting the XML syntax of the 'xslt' version?
I.e. better error reporting too?
I think the advantages of an XML-based syntax are:
(a) it's useful where the stylesheet includes large chunks of stuff to
copy into the result document
(b) it's useful when you want to transform stylesheets or to
do any kind
of reflection or introspection
(c) it reuses all the XML machinery such as character encodings, base
URIs, entity references
(d) it's much easier to provide user or vendor extensions to the
language in a controlled way.
But there's no doubt that the XQuery style makes it much
easier to write
short queries.
I read that as a +1 for 'xslt' style Dimitre?
regards DaveP.
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