Re: [PLUG] XML, text, and the development of unix

[Magnus <chrish@trilug.org>]

On Monday, November 24, 2003, at 10:19  PM, Jeff Abrahamson wrote:

> But, as rich and valuable as XML is, it makes ad hoc tool use more
> difficult.  For example, if we were designing unix today, we might
> spec the system files to use XML.  But, for example, now I might say
>
>     grep /bin/bash /etc/passwd | wc -l
>
> to find out how many users have set bash as their login shell, I'm not
> sure how I could do that in a single line if /etc/passwd were
> /etc/passwd.xml.

The example is only representative of standalone systems.  Already our 
basic configuration files are being stored somewhere else, often in a 
non-text format.  Your command would likely have to start with a ypcat 
on some older or less secure networks, or maybe ldapsearch on a newer 
network.  If you were at any of the big universities using Hesiod you 
might need to use dig.

The UNIX & Linux community is adaptive.  It must be.  If /etc/passwd 
were ever to become /etc/passwd.xml, you can bet it'll take a couple of 
days before you see a listing on freshmeat.net for a tool that takes 
passwd.xml as STDIN and spits plain text passwd through STDOUT (and 
likely go the other way as well) which becomes part of your standard 
tool chain.  Such a tool would likely evolve to grok the DTD's of most 
common system config files that end up using XML.

--

C. Magnus Hedemark
http://trilug.org/~chrish
"The only way to keep your health is to eat what you don't want, drink 
what you don't like, and do what you'd rather not." - Mark Twain

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