Re: Are multi-language languages unique to the XML family of languages?

>    <query  XML:NOTATION="SQL">SELECT x FROM y</query>


This reminds me of (
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/previous-versions/dotnet/netframework-4.0/ms256042(v=vs.100)
):

<msxsl:script language = "language-name" implements-prefix = "prefix of
user's namespace"> </msxsl:script>
And i vaguely remember that for a time there was XSLT 1.1 that had its own
<xsl:script> element.

Thanks,
Dimitre

On Sat, Mar 5, 2022 at 11:09 PM Rick Jelliffe <[email protected]>
wrote:

>
>
> On Sun, 6 Mar. 2022, 10:02 Roger L Costello, <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> Hi Folks,
>>
>> Consider the C language. It is one language. It doesn't use (host) other
>> languages. Consequently, it is relatively straightforward to create a
>> single grammar for the C language. Once the grammar is created, a robust
>> parser can be created.
>>
>> Ditto for every other programming language.
>>
>
> No.
>
> It is common to embed other query languages in C, Java, etc:  SQL, Regex,
> Xpath, URLs, even shell commands. Common practise for 40+ years.  And
> almost every language has conventions for formatted strings with variable
> substitutions.
>
> In fact nowadays languages --as used-- are *less* standard than ever: if
> you use C or Java or most general purpose languages, you may well be using
> annotations or other extensions and preprocessors.  And you may be
> generating JavaScript, CSS, JSON, HTML and so on, but be developing in
> Typescript, Less, ExtJSON, templated HTML. Angular is a good example of
> this.
>
> In fact, all the little standard languages that prided themselves on
> idealistic "simplicity" almost immediately degenerated into, in effect,
> mutually incompatible dialects as different pre-processors, mostly doing
> the same things, proliferated.  Why don't we just call a spade a spade:
> omitting support for the things needed for basic software engineering does
> not make a little language "minimalist", it makes it "fatuous". For all our
> YAintGNI bravado, it always turned out YAreGNI.
>
> The exception? XML, where there was less need to invent annotations
> (attributes or PIs), server side includes (general entities), simple
> macros, templates (attributes or PIs), let alone comments (comments).  And
> where many of the more complex preprocessings could be done in ubituitous
> XSLT.
>
> In traditional SGML terminology, I think Roger is saying that because XML
> schema languages have abandoned any idea of "NOTATION"  for attribute
> values or data content, there is no standard way either in markup or in
> schemas to label strings according to their little language. So there is no
> standard "seamless" way for an IDE to be able to colour that text or
> specially validate it.  (This is the same issue as not knowing if a qname
> in content is content, b.t.w.)
>
> So Roger cannot create a robust parser without some non-standard
> information. Not just to parse some embedded notation, but even to know
> which data is of that notation.
>
> (IDEs solve this in 2 ways: first, standard libraries such as string
> formatting libraries are treated as special cases and built in; second,
> annotation processors allow extra information that plugins can use. )
>
> So to Roger's questions: no, embedding little languages is ubiquitous;
> yes, XML does not have good support for a parser to know what embedded
> notations are used and where; and I think this was an own-goal that
> unnecessarily reduced the utility of XML in favour of the things it is not
> particularly good for: sending labelled simple strings around.
>
> <Digging up the dead>
> I recall raising this issue of embedded notations in data at the W3C XML
> Schema discussions. I recall two answers: "whatever the answer is, it isn't
> notations"  and "you cannot do anything without types" (I.e. if you have
> data types and lists/unions etc that exhausted the useful things an XML
> document needed: i.e. an XML document was a serialization of a database or
> object only.)   ...As I understand it, most XSLT is still done without
> types (if we ignore the extra @as'es that XSLT2+ demands we put in) which
> puts paid to the second comment?
>
> I do have some sympathy for the view that syntax is not a schema issue
> (though wouldn't that kinda undercuts all lexical datatyping? ...
> nevermind) and so notation identification is some other kind of
> declaration: e.g.
>    <query  XML:NOTATION="SQL">SELECT x FROM y</query>
> or
>     <query><? XML:NOTATION name="SQL"?>SELECT x FROM y</query>
> or
>      <thing  query="&lt;?XML:NOTATION name='SQL'?>SELECT x FROM y" />
> or
>       <?XML:NOTATION path="query" name="SQL" ?>
>        ...
>        <query>SELECT x FROM y</query>
>
> One thing XML DTDs ditched was the ability to declare that an attribute
> value is to be treated not as data but as a PI. XML Schemas followed this.
> So there was no standard way for a parser to know this was some special
> information (let alone resolve the target.)  So XML is in this situation
> where the decision not to treat PIs and NOTATION as first class citizens
> has reduced its applicability, or rather, provides no help for parsing
> embedded little languages using standard declarations.
>
> I would have liked something like this, where the first token is some
> simple target like other PIs:
>  <!ATTLIST thing query PI #REQUIRED>
> ...
> <thing query="sql SELECT x FROM y" />
> Just enough to know the value is special, and to hint what it is. But many
> other approaches are fine.
>
> Regards
> Rick
>
>>

-- 
Cheers,
Dimitre Novatchev
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