I've been reading the recent discussion of XML with some interest. I'm
working on the XML Interest group (the advisory group, not the deciding
group). I can say that all of the kinds of interface features you are
describing are as easy to develop as for SGML -- much easier, if you count
the efort to implement the parser for doucments. Like SGML, XML itself does
not have any prescribed user interface, although the eventual XML
stylesheet language will have a great effect on what most XML processors
look like.

   I also have a URL here for at least part of the Microsoft submission for
the stylesheet language for XML. This has no official force, and may not
even end up being the basis for further work, if some other proposal is
chosen as a start, but may be of interest to the technically inclined:

     http://www.w3.org/TR/NOTE-XSL-970910

   While the W3C group is open only to invited SGML experts and paying W3C
members, there is a developer's mailing list for communication between
those working on XML products. I would venture to guess that the developer
audience would be interested in summaries of important features for your
application area, both ones that that you use currently, and those that you
would like in the future. Think of it as giving them some proactive market
research.

Here's some information on XML-Dev for those who want to observe or participate

>xml-dev: A list for W3C XML Developers
>Archived as: http://www.lists.ic.ac.uk/hypermail/xml-dev/
>To unsubscribe, send to [log in to unmask] the following message;
>unsubscribe xml-dev
>
>To subscribe, send to [log in to unmask] the following message;
>subscribe xml-dev
>
>List coordinator, Henry Rzepa ([log in to unmask])


And a recent note From Peter Murray-Rust on that list about a "selected
messages" archive:

>XML-DEV has been active for about 7 months and generated around 1000 postings.
>This information is searchable thanks to Henry Rzepa. However there are some
>postings which I feel are of lasting value and are not easy to locate by
>keywords and other places where the thread has been useful (and perhaps
>re-usable by newcomers to XML). I have therefore created a page of links to
>the archived postings which is at:
>
>http://www.vsms.nottingham.ac.uk/vsms/xml/jewels.html

_________________________________________
David Durand              [log in to unmask]  \  [log in to unmask]
Boston University Computer Science        \  Sr. Analyst
http://www.cs.bu.edu/students/grads/dgd/   \  Dynamic Diagrams
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