Re: Not key themes anymore

[allen rouse <arouse austin ibm com>]

Apologies to all and to Jim and Russel if I have misunderstood the
subject of this thread!

Jim Pick wrote:
> 
> Russell Nelson <nelson@crynwr.com> writes:
> 
> > Someone suggested that the way to expose this functionality is through
> > a user-interface description language, which they pointed out is what
> > XML is, in many ways.  This is a GREAT idea.
> 
> It's ok, it's nothing new though.

No, it isn't. 


> 
> Here's how I see things stack up:
> 
> Here's a conventional web browser like Netscape:
> 
>  HTML -> Web Browser + Executable stuff (ActiveX/Java/JavaScript) -> User
> 
> For the XML approach to work to generate programs, you need the XML
> browser to render the dialogs/windows.  So you have:
> 
>  XML  -> XML Browser + Executable stuff (CORBA, etc.) -> User

(this is my own take on things)
This "old" idea has NOTHING to do with web browsers. 
Forget the (mistaken) idea that XML is tied to the WWW and browsers for
just a millisecond.

Imagine that you got sick (or didn't have time)  of writing C or
whatever lang you use to define a gui for your program. You decide
instead to write a gui using some CGI+HTML+browser combo. Now look at
what you have done. Whatever you don't like you can easily go back and
change. And you don't have to recompile. And you don't have to write
what is essentially the SAME code yet again.

You see what was done? Inside the browser you have built a gui for your
program. 

Now imagine a program/library/window manager that will read an XML file
and build & display a gui for you ON YOUR DESKTOP. 


> This isn't really all that different from a conventional approach, ie.
> using an interpreter or compiler:
> 
>  Scheme Source -> Guile Interpreter + Libraries -> User
>  C Source -> C Compiler & Linker + Libraries -> User
> 
> The only real difference is that you call the HTML or XML a
> "document", whereas you call Scheme or C "source code".  That's all
> just semantics, really.  If you called Scheme source a "Scheme Markup
> Language document", and Guile a "Scheme Browser" - it doesn't look
> any different than the XML or HTML approach.

Wrong! 
XML source can be checked to verify that it conforms to spec. Yes, I
know that you can do the same for Scheme and C. The difference is that
the XML will still DISPLAY. Valid, linted C code can still just dump
core on execution.

besides, with the approach that you call the conventional one, can
someone change the very layout & look of the gui WITHOUT having to muck
around with the C/Guile/binary of the app at all? 

In fact I think it may be possible to go further and mix and match parts
of different applications (the buttons, menus, etc are all just a kind
of "url" anyway) to make a hybrid app.

> 
> This does raise security issues.  If you implement an XML browser that
> has code-executing qualities, you either want to limit it to local
> files, or implement a security scheme like ActiveX, Java or Penguin.

This is not about browsing the web! It's about building a gui for your
programs!

   App = <program binary> + <XML gui specification>. 





> Cheers,
> 
>  - Jim
> 

Cheers dude.