I was pretty agnostic on the matter; I won't use them, but can cope
with them. But I got this message from O'Reilly's German office
today. They're a pretty clued group of people, but a book rife with
empty end-tags had them stumped:
------- Start of forwarded message -------
Date: Tue, 19 May 1998 12:27:56 +0200 (MET DST)
To: Chris Maden <crism@ora.com>
From: ... <...@ora.de>
Subject: (SGML) end tags in Linux Device Drivers
Hi Chris,
in "Linux Device Drivers" the sgml files contain </> as end tags for
everything instead of specific end tags (like </title>, </para>, etc.)
Is this only because this book was written in SGML by the author or
will we have this kind of end tag in future sgml files from
FrameMaker->SGML conversion.
I ask because we have a simple Perl script which produces readable
HTML files (for reviewers, proof readers etc.). It has worked fine for
us during the last projects. With </> as an unspecific end tag we
cannot use this script. It's not a problem for our translation of
Device Drivers (the typesetter can handle it) - I just would like to
know which end tags will be used for the next projects (and if it
would be worth the effort to update our Perl script).
Regards,
...
------- End of forwarded message -------
Now, the Perl script could have been updated, but to handle the
general case (even in an XML+empty-end-tag world) would have added
considerable complexity to what's currently a pretty simple script.
They can use spam to get around this, or hack up a custom solution for
this simpler case (which is what one of their people did). But it's
confusing and even potentially dangerous, without a pretty large chunk
of SGML knowledge (ref. _The SGML FAQ Book_; you need to know a lot to
avoid *accidentally* using a feature).
I have to side with Jon Bosak et al. that empty end-tags are
potentially a sizable amount of trouble, and that the perceived value
is negligible in a compressed-transfer world.
-Chris
-- <!NOTATION SGML.Geek PUBLIC "-//Anonymous//NOTATION SGML Geek//EN"> <!ENTITY crism PUBLIC "-//O'Reilly//NONSGML Christopher R. Maden//EN" "<URL>http://www.oreilly.com/people/staff/crism/ <TEL>+1.617.499.7487 <USMAIL>90 Sherman Street, Cambridge, MA 02140 USA" NDATA SGML.Geek>