[DOC-SIG] What I don't like about SGML

[Guido van Rossum]

Fred Drake:
>   Have you used GML?  I have.  It was probably nice when it was new,
> but certainly was showing problems by the time I used it.  Script/VS
> (the processor I used) also allowed "control words" which looked a lot 
> like troff dot-commands.  I ended up using a lot of these because the
> mechanisms for defining new logical markup were very poorly documented 
> as far as I could tell.  I had to define macros on top of the
> Script/VS control words.
>   The SGML is see now has definately evolved a long way from those
> roots, though the better aspects of GML are still there (structure).
> I don't think the GML background of SGML can be meaningfully held up
> as a problem with SGML; I think Goldfarb learned a lot from GML's
> failures when by the time SGML was defined.

Hm, I'm not sure if we're talking about the same GML then.  According
to Goldfarb's home page (http://www.sgmlsource.com/):

- For history buffs, some reliable papers on the early history of SGML
  and its precursor, GML. I invented SGML in 1974, and led the technical
  efforts of several hundred people for a dozen years that developed it
  into its present form as an International Standard. You can read some
  of that story in the SGML History Niche.

Anyway, this was just in response to Paul Prescod.  I claimed (and
still claim) that SGML's input methods have its roots in punched
cards.  Paul responded that it was standardized in 1986, when PCs were
common.  Goldfarb's remark indicates that SGML is much older than
that...

--Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/)


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