Those are good points. I may have made too strong of a connection between Goldfarb's intentions and the intentions of Yuri Rubinsky. The two did work closely together and you can get a sense of the ideas they shared about sgml in this tribute that Goldfarb wrote: http://xml.coverpages.org/yuriMemGoldfarb.html
On Thu, Sep 4, 2008 at 3:01 AM, Norbert Bollow <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Xavier Leonard <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > >> many web 2.0 technologies employ xml >> xml evolved from sgml >> >> one Charles Goldfarb's main motivations for developing sgml was to >> make books more accessible to people with visual disabilities. > > If this information is accurate, I'd be very interested in having > a quotable source for this... > >> a little more about this (very little, unfortunately) can be found in >> this Goldfarb bio: http://www.sgmlsource.com/press/CGbioFull.htm > > Alas, this document does not contain the assertion about accessibilty > work being one of the driving motivations in the development of SGML. > (It only mentions making "more information accessible to people with > reading disabilities" as an _effect_ of "the widespread deployment of > markup languages".) > > Based on the interviews on the same site, I'm coming to the conclusion > that while work on an SGML-based accessibility project turned out to > be from Goldfarb's personal perspective "the most rewarding markup project" > that he had ever been involved in [1], this application area was not in > fact the original motivation for the development of GML and SGML. At > least, when asked about the original motivations for these developments, > he didn't mention accessibility aspects: > > In [2]: > > Q: Dr. Goldfarb, you led the project at IBM that invented SGML's > precursor, GML. It's said that necessity is the mother of > invention. What specific problem were you trying to solve? > > A: We were trying to do an automated law-office application. I had > been a lawyer (in fact, I still am). Lawyers must do research on > existing case law, decisions of court, and so on, to find out which > ones are applicable to a given situation, find out what the previous > legal rulings have been, and then merge that with text that the lawyer > has written himself. Eventually, if it's, say, a brief for the court, > [he must] then compose it and print it. At the time, which was 1969 or > 1970, there weren't any systems available that did these three > things. So in order to get the systems to share the data we had to > come up with a way to represent it that was independent of any of > those applications. > > > In [3]: > > Q: How did you get started with SGML? > > A: After Ed Mosher and Ray Lorie and I completed our GML project, I > decided to pursue some of the ideas further. I felt that a DTD could > be created in a form that computers could read, and therefore be able > to validate markup without actually processing the document. I proved > it in 1974, so I consider that the start of SGML. Of course, it took > another decade -- and hundreds of talented people -- to develop it > into an International Standard. > > [1] http://www.sgmlsource.com/press/Losi.htm > [2] http://www.sgmlsource.com/press/Floyd1.htm > [3] http://www.sgmlsource.com/press/Kennedy.htm > > > Greetings, > Norbert > > -- > Norbert Bollow <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Informatics Management and Consulting for Adaptability and Benefit/Cost > Optimization in Harmony with Human Rights and Needs > _______________________________________________ > DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list > DIGITALDIVIDE@digitaldivide.net > http://digitaldivide.net/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide > To unsubscribe, send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word UNSUBSCRIBE > in the body of the message. > -- Xavier Leonard Heads On Fire :: Fab Lab 4305 University Avenue, Suite 130 San Diego, CA 92105 ph.:619.964.6522 fx.:954.208.9573 [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.headsonfire.org "Change By Design" _______________________________________________ DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list DIGITALDIVIDE@digitaldivide.net http://digitaldivide.net/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide To unsubscribe, send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of the message.
