[XML-SIG] Simple DTD syntax?

Terry Hancock hancock@earthlink.net
Tue, 28 Nov 2000 23:29:26 -0800


Hi,
For a game project we're working on, we want to define
XML format files to use as the game "source code".
Basically, they'll define common objects used in the
game, so that programming is simplified.  More complex
constructs will be handled by python code embedded
in the XMLs.

I want to formally define the format of the XMLs, and
writing a DTD appears to be the way to do this. However,
so far I can find only sample DTDs and the full-blown
XML specification.  Surely there's a Human-readable
source on the file syntax for a DTD -- they don't
like _that_ complicated!  I have in mind something of
similar complexity to the XBEL DTD that I found from
the Python website.

I gather that it's possible to merge multiple DTD
so that I can subclass from a format with more features,
or combine elements from different modules of the
game engine with a DTD for each (easier to separate
responsibility for them that way, since there's
more than one person involved on this).

I was really surprised to find this to be so
obfuscated.  I would've thought this would be
relatively simple -- I mean it shouldn't really
be harder than writing a grammar for Bison, should
it?  I must not be looking in the right places.

Thanks!

-- 
Terry Hancock
hancock@earthlink.net