Re: [Boost-users] Boost serialization xml format and xml comments

From: Robert Ramey (ramey_at_[hidden])
Date: 2006-08-15 14:23:39

Todd Greer wrote:
> Matt Schuckmann wrote:
>
>> Since the Serialization library doesn't use a complete xml
>> grammar (like what is provided on the Spirit examples page) and
>> since it doesn't let Spirit see the entire text it isn't quite as
>> easy as it might seem to make it work. So far I've gotten it to
>> ignore comments before and after most tags but I'm not sure if it'll
>> work in the general case.
>
> I wonder if, long term, it might be worth rewriting xml_iarchive to
> use a Spirit grammar for the overall parser. Robert, is there a
> particular rationale for the hybrid approach that you used, or is
> that just a product of how familiar you were with Spirit at the time?

As noted above - I started with the one that came in the example.   Of
course this is a pretty big piece of code and took ages to compile. Also
I don't know that it handled all the attributes I used.  And of course
this choked almost every compiler in some way or another.  So it was
an iterative process driven by the compiler quirks.  That fact that I
was/is new to spirit may also have played a role.  I was very pleased
to find this code and I have been very pleased how pain free the
maintanence is.  I very much wanted to avoid getting bogged down
in xml issues and spirit/xml has has been a godsend for me.

I notice from time to time the quesion of xml, tiny_xml, etc, etc.
varieties of xml parsers are desired for different purpose.  I suspect
that spirit/xml isn't sufficiently appreciated.  It DOES have a
learning curve - but it's well, well worth it.  For me the proof is
that I've almost never had to go back and mess with it except
onthe most rare occasions.  And they spirit team has left
spirt 1.6x around for older compilers.  And they have have avoided
the urge to constantly fiddle with the public interface.

As I said before - spirt is godsend for me.  I can't tell you how
much I appreciate the fact that it has worked so well.

Robert Ramey