Hiya, I was wondering if anyone had any thoughts on the conventions we should use in our xml files. Essentially when should we use attributes and when should we use elements.
One school of thought saids we always use attributes if the value can only appear once. The negative aspect of this is that you can get elements with massive numbers of attributes like <component name="X" impl="com.biz.X" version="1.0.2" displayName="The magnificent X" description="X is a ...." ... /> This is fairly common in document centric descriptors. Another school of though saids that you never use attributes. Like most of descriptors that come out of Sun. It is easier to extend, but this ends up with fairly verbose files like the following. The other problem is that if you want to validate using DTDs you end up with stupid names like <component-name> in an element <component> (see servlet/ejb descriptors for an example). <component> <name>X</name> <impl>com.biz.X</impl> <version>1.0.2</version> ... </component> The other pattern I have noticed is that some people prefer to store "meta" data about element as attributes while they store "content" data as elements. So any preferences among these alternatives? My current thinking is that we should probably go with the Sun-style (no attributes) just because it is more common in java world. Thoughts? -- Cheers, Peter Donald -------------------------------- These aren't the droids you're looking for. Move along. -------------------------------- -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> For additional commands, e-mail: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
