[Zope3-dev] Re: Re: RFC: ZConfig and other formats for ZCML

[Martin Aspeli]

On Tue, 24 Jan 2006 10:16:13 -0000, Chris Withers <chris at simplistix.co.uk>  
wrote:

>> Commercial development tools typically have pretty decent XML support,  
>> and if
>> you were to write e.g. a ZCML editor as an Eclipse plug in, being able  
>> to rely
>> on existing XML components would be much easier. Developers familiar  
>> with J2EE,
>> .NET etc. are used to XML configuration files, and have editors and  
>> tools they
>> are comfortable with. Being able to use those same tools (oh, it's just  
>> XML) may
>> ease the learning curve a little.
>>  Also, I assume there's a DTD or XML Schema for the ZCML syntax, which  
>> would let
>> such tools validate and auto-complete ZCML syntax - a valuable way to  
>> save time
>> if you're not intimately familiar with the syntax.
>
> While I agree with all of this, I've never seen anyone actually do this  
> for anything Zope-related so far. ZPT is a prime example where this was  
> touted as a good reason to go for an XML-based attribute language, but  
> no-one ever developed these tools. As such, I'm tempted to cry "yagni"  
> on XML-because-its-easier-for-tools...

With a valid DTD or XML Schema (which is easily produced; I would've  
thought one already existed for ZCML, if not, it's a strange omission),  
any serious XML tool will be able to validate and sanity-check your ZCML  
files.

Martin

-- 
(muted)