From: Tobias Reif <tobiasreif@...>
Date: 2001-11-22T22:30:52+09:00
Subject: [ruby-talk:26135] Re: Conformance Test of XML Parsers in Ruby(20011122)

David Alan Black wrote:

 > But if a document is valid, then it's also well-formed, so it does
 > make sense that the parser would not raise an error.

Sure, but there are some misunderstandings... (sorry if I expressed 
myself confusingly)


>>>I don't think 99% conformant parser is useless because it's just not 100%,
>>>
> 
> It's pretty close to useless... at least it won't be taken seriously by
> people who don't want to have to worry about the 1%, possibly.


I agree; (and I didn't write any of the above.)


>>>but I think all valid documents should be parsed without raising
>>>error (is it reasonable criterion?).


so what are reasonable criterions?:

I said:


>>I don't think so. Parsers can do a lot of wrong things with well-formed
>>documents without raising an arror.


meaning: if parsers parse well-formed/valid documents, and don't raise 
an error, that doesn't tell too much. They can still do many wrong things.

Then a completely different point was, as a criterion to add to the tests:


>>... and all well-formedness errors must cause an error report.


nothing to do with the above valid etc stuff.
Just an important criterion when testing the conformance of parsers.

One of the main aspects of non-validating parsers.

Tobi



-- 
Tobias Reif
http://www.pinkjuice.com/myDigitalProfile.xhtml

go_to('www.ruby-lang.org').get(ruby).play.create.have_fun
http://www.pinkjuice.com/ruby/