Re: analysis of YANG vs. RELAX NG

[Juergen Schoenwaelder <[e-mail]>]

On Mon, Dec 03, 2007 at 02:56:02PM +0100, Ladislav Lhotka wrote:
> Tim Bray p????e v Ne 02. 12. 2007 v 12:42 -0800:
> > I've been staying off this thread because I don't understand what a
> > NETCONF is or what you'd do with one.  But Julian's point is massively
> > important.  If you're going to design your own modeling language, you
> > need to spend a *lot* of time thinking about the extensibility model.
> > It's really easy to get wrong.  -Tim
> 
> Indeed. An extensibility problem in YANG is IMO the leaf statement. It
> is encoded as an XML element but the fact that it is declared as leaf
> effectively makes it into an XML attribute: It is impossible to extend
> it (e.g., add a qualifying subelement) without changing the leaf into
> container. In a RELAX NG schema, if properly designed, such an extension
> wouldn't have to touch the parent schema.

Leafs carry data and we strongly dislike mixed contents in NETCONF. So
this is actually a YANG feature and not a bug.
 
> Another problem might be the default statement in leaves (or it is
> proper to say leafs here?:-) or typedefs. What if a standard data model
> defines an item, say a hello timer, with such a default, but an
> implementation wants to use another value for the default? Should it
> come up with another schema?

No. There can only be one standard default. If you are thinking about
reusable groupings, then defaults can actually be changed wherever you
apply a grouping as far as I know.

/js

-- 
Juergen Schoenwaelder           Jacobs University Bremen gGmbH
Phone: [phone]         Campus Ring 1, 28759 Bremen, Germany
Fax:   [phone]         <http://www.jacobs-university.de/>