[XML-SIG] DOM: backward compatibility

[Andrew M. Kuchling]

Guido van Rossum writes:
>Unix "Make" program.  This was probably around Unix v6.  Someone
>inside Bell Labs complained to the author about a particular
>misfeature (I believe it was about requiring an actual tab character,
>-- instead of any whitespace -- to start a command).  The author
>responded that he agreed that it was a misfeature, but that there were
>already more than ten users (all inside Bell Labs), so that for
>reasons of backwards compatibility he couldn't change it.

	I've heard that story.  I also once read an interview
somewhere where Dennis Ritchie, when asked if he would have done
anything differently in Unix, answered "Spelled creat() correctly."

-- 
A.M. Kuchling			http://starship.skyport.net/crew/amk/
In Rome, in Leningrad, in Darwin. "The door flew open, in he ran, the great,
long, red-legged scissorman."
    -- From DOOM PATROL #20