[microformats-discuss] Microformats, REST, and XML

[Dr. Ernie Prabhakar]

On Sep 19, 2005, at 12:05 PM, Kevin Marks wrote:

> Another angle on the discussions regarding XML vs XHTML, and  
> touching on REST, is the context of use.
>
> If you are using XML to pass data around between your own  
> applications and never touching the web, then the extra degree of  
> control gained by constructing your own arbitrary data structure in  
> XML may be worth it.
>
> If however, you are intending to send the data over a webserver,  
> using a REST API, then using microformats in XHTML (and in  
> particular XOXO) has many benefits:

Fascinating.   This is one of the things I've wondered about. In a  
world where everybody "grokked" microformats, would there ever be a  
need for new (public) XML documents? Or could we do everything with  
microformatted XHTML -- and, perhaps, Atom.  Certainly, I would think  
things like DocBook would make far more sense as a XHTML application  
rather than their own XML schema.

This is more than a theoretical question.   As you know, Mac OS X  
uses property lists (the moral equivalent of XOXO, at least to first  
order) for many types of data transport.  There's often discussion  
about when/where an app should simply use a plist dictionary for data  
storage vs. defining a custom XML document type.

What would this list recommend as the best practice (assuming plist =  
XOXO for purpose of discussion)?

-- Ernie P.