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Re: Can sets have order?
- To: xsl-list at lists dot mulberrytech dot com
- Subject: Re: [xsl] Can sets have order?
- From: Uche Ogbuji <uche dot ogbuji at fourthought dot com>
- Date: Thu, 25 Jan 2001 11:11:03 -0700
- Reply-To: xsl-list at lists dot mulberrytech dot com
>
> > The pure mathematician (David) wins that point.
>
> OK if you turn up in Oxford, I'll buy you a beer:-)
>
> > The reason I objected to David's going on about sets not having order is that
> > he seemed to be claiming that node sets do not have order.
>
> I didn't just seem to be, I was!
>
>
> I find it much easier to understand XSL semantics for myself, and to
> explain them to others, if I take this point of view.
> I think the original confusion in the "nearest ancester thread" came
> about precisely because people were not thinking in this way.
With this, and after carefully browsing the XPath spec, I'm agreed.
Game. Set. Match.
I'd never really thought clearly about this, and I responded without pausing
to think clearly. I'd say I won't do it again, but I'd be lying.
The funny part is that I (and colleagues) spent a considerable time pounding
my head over the spec's obtuse wording with regard to reverse axes and
proximity position in implementing (or rather fixing 4XPath months ago.)
At that point I think it was actually made it easier for me to think of the
node set in terms of having an intrinsic order. The proof of it is in
4XPath's implementation, which I'm pretty sure gets that mess quite right.
--
Uche Ogbuji Principal Consultant
uche.ogbuji@fourthought.com +1 303 583 9900 x 101
Fourthought, Inc. http://Fourthought.com
4735 East Walnut St, Ste. C, Boulder, CO 80301-2537, USA
Software-engineering, knowledge-management, XML, CORBA, Linux, Python
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