/////\\\\\////\\\\////\\\\////\\\\////\\\\////\\\\///\\\/\ \ / \ Welcome to the SGML Newswire \ / / \ To subscribe, send email to sgmlinfo@avalanche.com \ / To unsubscribe, send message 'unsubscribe'. \ \ To receive a current table of contents, and \ / instructions for ordering back issues, / \ specify 'send toc' in the body of your \ / message. Please also pass along info / \ to interested colleagues. \ / / ////\\\\////\\\\////\\\\////\\\\////\\\\////\\\\///\\\\/// WIRED MAGAZINE'S SGML ARTICLE ============================= (Doesn't it seem about time?) Summary of "Toward a Universal Library: SGML and the future of electronic documents." By David Siverman In the August 1995 issue of Wired magazine, Mr. Silverman comments on Wired's Senior Columnist, Nicolas Negroponte's statement that "each item submitted to the Library of Congress be accompanied by its digital source" (Wired 3.05, page 224). Mr. Silverman comments that while this is a nice idea there are certain problems, "with current technology," he states, "the result would be disastrous. Some books would be in ASCII, some in Microsoft Word, others in obsolete formats long forgotten. It would be a library of Bable: brimming with information, most of it unintelligible." Mr. Silverman puts for the supposition that a universal language is needed that can describe any document to every computer. The leading candidate, according to Mr. Silverman, is SGML. Mr. Silverman goes on to say that although SGML has been an international standard since 1986 it is only now becoming accepted as a standard. As it is beginning to be accepted it is facing new competition from privately backed solutions like Adobe's acrobat. Mr. Silverman goes on to describe the way that documents are looked at for markup. And he points out the inherent advantages to SGML over its competitors and gives a short example of markup. He uses this demonstration to segue into a comparison of HTML to SGML. Mr. Silverman's final emphasis is on the shortcomings of SGML/HTML and the future. He suggests that an excellent compromise for the future would be a language with tags that identifies the content and also gives meaning to how the content should be displayed. His final statement is that "we should end up with universal language for multimedia documents, available to both graphic designers and librarians." ////\\\\////\\\\///\\\///\\\\////\\\\///\\\\///\\\\///\ \ / / SGML NEWSWIRE LIST MANAGER \ \ Sue Martin-Gamble, Interleaf / \ 4999 Pearl East Circle, Ste 100 \ / Boulder, Colorado 80301 / \ VOX 303/449-5032 x 109 \ / FAX 303/449-3246 / \ sue@avalanche.com \ / / ////\/\/\/\/\//////\\\\////\\\\////\\\\////\\\\/// :) :)