On 23/07/2013 19:00, Shlomi Fish wrote:
Why do you feel that I've been "promoting" XML::LibXML in this thread?
Because you say
Instead one should use [XML::LibXML]
I call that promotion.
Why does the fact that I'm affiliated with it, prevent me from
recommending it over a different alternative, which I believe (and
can prove) that is inferior?
Because it is all but impossible for you to be impartial with your
recommendations when you have a specific interest in one of the
alternatives.
If you insist on doing so anyway then I wish you would make your
declarations a *lot* more prominent, i.e. the *first* thing you say
in your post, rather than a subsidiary clause in a secondary
paragraph.
Why do you feel I should do so? What was wrong with the disclaimer as
it stood?
Because I missed it the first time I read your post, so it isn't
unlikely that others would also overlook it.
I try to avoid recommending XS-based modules when I sense that the OP
may have trouble digging himself out of a hole when a CPAN module has
failed to install.
Well, XML::XPath depends on XML::Parser which is an XS module (and not a core
one)
This is one of those "facts" that I thought I had once established for
certain and have never looked at again. I am grateful to be corrected.
However, I believe the XS component of XML::LibXML relies, in turn, on
the libxml2 library, which also needs compiling and linking. With yet
another process involved in installing the module I am still hesitant to
recommend (although I have the highest regard for Libxml2 itself).
XML::XPath works fine here. It is plenty fast enough,
and the data doesn't use namespaces. You have no reason to disparage it.
The original poster may need to use namespaces, and he may run into a bug that
has crept in XML::XPath since its last release in 2003, and the data may be
larger than you are trying it on. As a result, I can no longer recommend it in
the general case.
In my original answer I wrote
This program shows just how easy it is to use `XML::XPath`. There are
several other modules that will do the job if this one isn't to your taste.
So I hope I wasn't understood to be recommending XML::Xpath in the
general case. In part I was trying to give another module some exposure,
when the limelight is usually shared between XML::LibXML and XML::Twig.
It certainly works fine with the data in question and I would not choose
to avoid it just because of its age when I know that there are many
instances of much older installations of Perl itself. There are many
examples of much less satisfactory modules, such as the dreadful but
still-popular XML::Simple which was updated just a year ago.
I hope this clarifies my standpoint.
Rob
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