XHTML, XML, fancy text, and applications

[MURATA Makoto]

On Sun, 13 Apr 2003 14:12:17 +0200
Linus Walleij <triad at df.lth.se> wrote:

> This discussion is new on this list and sound confusing to me. It would
> be nice to have a briefing on the background facts.

I believe that Appendix A of RFC 3023 answers your questions.  I quote 
one paragraph, but please read that appendix entirely.

>    Sniffing XML also isn't as simple as it might seem.  DOCTYPE
>    declarations aren't required, and they can appear fairly deep into a
>    document under certain unpreventable circumstances.  (E.g., the XML
>    declaration, comments, and processing instructions can occupy space
>    before the DOCTYPE declaration.) Even sniffing the DOCTYPE isn't
>    completely reliable, thanks to a variety of issues involving default
>    values for namespaces within external DTDs and overrides inside the
>    internal DTD.  Finally, the variety in potential character encodings
>    (something XML provides tools to deal with), also makes reliable
>    sniffing less likely.

-- 
MURATA Makoto <murata at hokkaido.email.ne.jp>