Re: XML* vs. eXpat

Rory Hewitt wrote:

Adam,

And then they have this XML stuff, with %HANDLER and %XML parameters... At
least I would have called the BIF's something like INTO and PARSE...

(...)

Maybe I'm just grumpy this morning.

Maybe just a little bit grumpy <grin>. Seriously, I like the %XML parameter: it allows you to use the same basic syntax whether your data is in a file or in a variable. That's nice. Plus it gives you a chance to specify a bunch of processing options, so that as time goes on they can add features without having to change the syntax drastically.

The %Handler is just the way things are. You're passing a procedure pointer. I was a little thrown by the concept of using a handler with XML-INTO, but once I figured it out it was actually cool: with XML-INTO you can process a file with an unspecified number of occurrences of a data structure, and use the handler to process one (or one chunk) at a time. Very, very slick.

You know me, I'll give IBM grief on things I don't like (I'm still mad that we don't have a %MOVE BIF), but IMHO the XML- syntax is quite well done.

Joe