[Standards] shared XML editing update

[Joonas Govenius]

Peter Saint-Andre wrote:
> Krutsch, Michael C. wrote:
>   
>> We believe that there are several differences between CDOs and SXE but the
>> key difference is that CDOs aren't editable; not in the sense that an object
>> defined by SXE is.  A collaborative data object is defined by a fixed schema
>> and the only thing that is user 'editable' are the contents of the CDO, but
>> not the structure of the CDO itself.  There isn't a mechanism (or even a
>> requirement or concept) to start with a 'blank' CDO and have users define
>> one in real time.  Once we have sufficient user feedback this might be an
>> issue that gets revisited, but it isn't on the radar right now.  We have
>> source to two reference implementations (I'll post to the announce list) and
>> I'll also make available a set of slides to help identify the use cases and
>> the implementation.
>>     
>
> That's helpful. Yes, I see that CDOs are much more structured than what
> folks are trying to enable with shared XML editing.
>
> As Ian Paterson pointed out to me a few years ago, our community
> experiences a continual tug-of-war between structure and freedom. For
> example:
>
> 1. We use XML, which is completely extensible, but then people want to
> know what might come over the wire so we define particular namespaces
> (including XML schemas to formally lock down the data formats).
>
> 2. We defined data forms (XEP-0004) as a completely free-form technology
> for data interchange, but then people want to formalize their data forms
> sometimes so we defined form-types (XEP-0068).
>
> ... you get the idea.
>
> So I wonder if there is a way to define shared XML editing or remote
> instance synchronization in such a way that it can meet the needs of
> folks who want more free-form editing and those who want more structured
> collaboration. I don't say that's necessary or that we need to meet
> disparate requirements with the same technology, only that it might be
> worth exploring.
>   

In principle, a particular application type can impose any structure 
that's expressible as an XML Schema just by specifying that the document 
being edited must conform to the schema. I think this would include 
CDOs. However, you might consider using SXE as the "transport" an 
overkill for such very structured documents...

Joonas