On 5/15/06, Isaac Jones wrote:

Lemmih writes:

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On 5/15/06, Isaac Jones wrote:

...

Greetings,

I'm wondering if we've ever discussed putting an XML parser into fptools. I'm asking because cabal-install would like to use xml-rpc, but it drags in a bunch of dependencies that aren't in fptools.

What do other languages do: * Python seems to have XML and XML-RPC as standard libraries * Same with ruby * Not java (shocking): http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.3/docs/api/

I guess that HaXml probably can't get into fptools because of license incompatibilities, but hxml and HXmlToolbox both have MIT licenses, and so could probably be put into fptools:

http://www.flightlab.com/~joe/hxml/ http://www.fh-wedel.de/~si/HXmlToolbox/

What do others think?

XML and xml-rpc are the wrong tools for cabal-install, IMO. Picking a tool that isn't suited for the task will not result in anything good, no matter how common and popular that tool happens to be. I only chose xml-rpc because it was easily available, and it resulted in several dirty hacks. Please, lets avoid enterprise, XML and managers in suits; The /right/ tools are out there. End of way too emotional rant.

Care to elaborate with some facts or details that can help the rest of us make a decision?

Well, XML/xml-rpc isn't very well suited for transferring binary data and that's pretty much the only thing cabal-install is interested in. Using bencoding would be more efficient and not drag in any dependencies. BEncoding is used by bittorrent and, hence, is implemented in almost every language. -- Friendly, Lemmih