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> most users have no need or interest in a schema that is a strange statement. users must reach out for a schema practically as soon as some data is exchanged
by college_physics 4y ago
> most users have no need or interest in a schema
that is a strange statement. users must reach out for a schema practically as soon as some data is exchanged
the only users that don't need a schema are the ones operating within a controlled environment where everything has been somehow agreed or imposed (e.g. within a walled garden or when you control both sides of the exchange)
missing, incomplete, low-information schemas about what data is supposed to mean and how it can be used correctly etc is a major, major wast of time. in data science circles the joke is that 90% of the work is "data cleaning". what do you think data cleaning is about?
- dfox 4y agoI think that the point there is that most users (and especially for RPC-ish applications, which is what most of the existing XSD documents are about) do not need a formal schema but the schema is only implied by the implementation. The issue there is that even if you have detailed formal schema and generate the interface code from that, there is still some ad-hoc contract between the generated interface code and rest of this application, and details of this ad-hoc contract will invariably leak through the interface code. Designing formats for long term storage of some kind of data is another thing and there formal schemas make sense. But that is not something that most users (meaning developers) do frequently or often even ever.
- GoblinSlayer 4y agoEven when you control both sides, code can still create unintended data due to bugs.
- college_physics 4y agonot to mention that future versions of yourself would think that past versions surely had mental bugs :-)
- bawolff 4y agoBut should care about and actually care about are different things.