Re: [Json] Schemas & so on

[John Cowan <[e-mail]>]

Peter Cordell scripsit:

> I disagree that JCR is "entirely useless".  

Sorry, I meant that using a plain JSON document as a JCR document is
entirely useless, not that JCR as a whole is useless.

> Examplotron is neat, but it makes lots of assumptions about what
> you're trying to express.  It essentially guesses what you mean by a
> construct.  

Well, I'd rather say that it has some well-documented conventions about
instance values.

> This may work for a little while, but soon runs out of
> steam.  There's a reason why people say you should be explicit about
> what you want.

>From the language designer's (and implenter's) viewpoint, yes.  From the
user's view, where the non-iconic features may be unnecessary for many
applications, not so much.  Examplotron has a gentler learning curve
than any explicit grammar-based system.

> Plus, there is the issue of practical syntax.  XML offers namespaces
> so you can do things like <bar eg:occurs="*"> to differentiate
> between one or more and zero or more (or optional etc).  Lacking
> even comments it's hard to see how a JSON based syntax could do this
> is an elegant way.  (I can imagine some ugly hacks involving
> unlikely member names, but I'd really rather not.)

And name quotation, yes.  I agree it's a problem.  Still, even if JSON
syntax should be or must be extended, I still think structural iconicity
where possible is an important principle.

> And the ability to explicitly state that you want a particular
> string (for example), rather than having that being inferred as any
> string, opens up the use of JCR as part of a test vector suite,
> which could be very useful as part of implementation validation.

Good point.

> So, very useful indeed IMO.

I have a lot of specific comments on JCR.  What's the best forum for them?

-- 
John Cowan          http://www.ccil.org/~cowan        [e-mail]
At times of peril or dubitation,
Perform swift circular ambulation,
With loud and high-pitched ululation.