Fred White <[log in to unmask]> (father of the IMAGE DBMS and avid
Mac OS X user, among many other qualities) wrote under "Unwinable Wars":

>(I chose the phrase "obvious reasons" as a challenge to Alfredo.) :-)

Thanks, Fred.  I love "obvious reasons".  For instance, in the link
on XML that Ken Hirsch so nicely provided, you will find this jewel
on slide 21 at http://xmlsucks.org/but_you_have_to_use_it_anyway/

____________________________________________________________

    Doing it Anyway

    - XML qua technology seems to be a bad joke

    - But you have to do it anyway

    - Two main reasons:

      1) The technological problems can be managed

      2) More importantly: everyone else is doing it
____________________________________________________________


Knowing Fred a little (after almost a quarter of a century of enjoyable
chats on all kinds of subjects), I strongly believe that Fred will
appreciate reason (2) above as the "most likely argument" provided
by standard "managers" :-)

I still believe my life-long claim to fame is that I was (theoretically,
at least) Fred's "manager" during his distinguished tenure as Adager's
Senior Scientist.  I sincerely hope I was a non-standard manager and
I also sincerely hope that I never did anything because "everyone else
was doing it".  I know that Fred would never do such a thing and I have
always admired him for that attitude.

"Because everyone else is doing it".  How sad, indeed.  Please note that
I have nothing against XML (or any other technology, for that matter).
What worries me is the reasoning behind the "you have to do it anyway"
argument.

   _______________
  |               |
  |               |
  |            r  |  Alfredo                     [log in to unmask]
  |          e    |                           http://www.adager.com
  |        g      |  F. Alfredo Rego
  |      a        |  Manager, R & D Labs
  |    d          |  Adager Corporation
  |  A            |  Sun Valley, Idaho 83353-3000            U.S.A.
  |               |
  |_______________|

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