What's it all about, Alfie?

I've been using XML for quite a while. I can see where it's useful, and more often than not, I can see applications of it that are horrible overuse of XML for the sake of using XML. For example, I can see XML as a configuration file with less than 100 lines in it. I have also seen XML as the transport for data streams of thousands of points. The first is a decent use of the format, the latter is stupid, plain and simple.

So I find myself again today working on a project that I haven't touched for months. It's got a ton of XML configuration - literally dozens of files and thousands of lines - some files having several thousand lines of XML each. I've heard people who are big proponents of XML say "You can have code stability while configuring your app in XML". Well... that's a true statement, but you could replace 'XML' in that statement with just about anything else - including simple key/value text files. But what seems to be the trend is that the XML files actually configure the system - hook up this feed to that processor, and add this dialog box at this point, etc. I've seen this all the way to the point that XML changes alone were responsible for adding completely new functionality to the app.

At this point, the XML is really the code. You can't call the framework of interpreting the XML and following it's rules of wiring things together the core, immutable, part of the system - and the only part needing source control, test cases, and other "project-level" attributes of a codebase, when the way in which the application works is really dictated by the XML. It's like calling the JVM the code and the compiled byte-code the "config files". Nope, baby... that's a runtime and that's the code it executes.

So don't bother saying XML is wonderful... it's OK. It's not alone, and it's not even the best implementation of the self-describing markup language. But it has it's uses. Unfortunately, I've seen far more abuses than valid uses of XML. I'm beginning to think they simply don't exist.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 2:57 pm and is filed under Coding, Vendors. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.