Sorry, Craig, but there's nothing to suggest that MIF has any basis in SGML,
either.
MIF existed in FrameMaker from version 1.0 in 1986, which was the same year
that SGML formally came into existence. Frame Technologies did not offer a
product that supported SGML until they released FrameBuilder in 1992 in the
FrameMaker 3.0 era.
There is a fundamental difference in philosophy and purpose between MIF and
SGML.
The whole idea behind SGML was to define a way in which information could the
marked up to self-identify the *semantic* purpose of the information
independently of the presentational aspects (formatting) of a particular
document. As tools for SGML were developed, the philosophy was that the
presentation should be driven by the semantic purpose of each information
element in its current context.
MIF, on the other hand, is focused almost entirely on the *presentational*
aspects of the information that is contained in a document. This is entirely
appropriate because the language is used within the environment of a document
processing software application.
There is also a fundamental difference in the way the markup is structured.
In SGML (and XML and HTML) only the tag names and attributes are contained
within pairs of angle brackets. The content is contained between pairs of
bracket-delimited tags (although the end tag may be assumed in some cases in
HTML and SGML). Parsing out everything that is contained in brackets yields the
raw, untagged text.
In MIF, *everything* is contained within the angle brackets as <name value>
tuples. The only thing that exists outside angle brackets are commentary
strings that identify MIF structures. The document content is actually
contained in delimited strings within a <String ` '> element that is wrapped up
in a bunch of nested formatting elements. For example, the following MIF
snippet represents a single cell of a table that contains a single text
character (I for "input") in a String element that is nested 4 levels deep
inside a Cell element, which is, in turn, nested inside Row, TblBody, and Tbl
elements:
<Cell
<CellContent
<Notes
> # end of Notes
<Para
<Unique 1022301>
<PgfTag `CellBodyCenter'>
<ParaLine
<String `I'>
> # end of ParaLine
> # end of Para
> # end of CellContent
> # end of Cell
If a text editor were to provide really useful on-screen highlighting, it would
have the ability to highlight all the lines that are within a matching pair of
brackets, such as the 11 lines that constitute the CellContent element or the
13 lines of the Cell element in the example. Just highlighting the element or
property name that follows the left angle bracket may look nice, but really
isn't particularly helpful IMO.
It's really unfortunate that people jump to the conclusion that any markup
language that uses angle brackets must be based on XML or HTML or SGML. There
are only a small number of characters on a standard keyboard that are suitable
for use as delimiters in a markup language and many different markup languages
*independently* chose angle brackets as the best option. In reality, we should
all be thankful that the authors of these markup languages chose something
relatively user-friendly like angle brackets rather than retaining the
ancestral form of markup use in IBM's Generalized Markup Language (GML) which
looked something like this:
:h1.Chapter 1: Introduction
:p.GML supported hierarchical containers, such as
:ol
:li.Ordered lists (like this one),
:li.Unordered lists, and
:li.Definition lists
:eol.
as well as simple structures.
:p.Markup minimization (later generalized and formalized in SGML),
allowed the end-tags to be omitted for the "h1" and "p" elements.Notice that
only the ordered list structure (:ol) has an explicit end delimiter (:eol),
whichc makes it really hard for a human reader to figure out wheretheheck you
are.
> From: [email protected]
> To: [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected]
> Subject: RE: What free Windows text editor should I use to look at MIF files?
> Date: Mon, 6 Oct 2014 07:32:26 -0500
>
>
>
> Perhaps
> a project should be started to work on defining a MIF highlighter for
> NotePad++, since one can create a User Defined highlighter.
>
>
>
>
>
> Also, since FM SGML was around earlier than FMs XML capabilities, would
> it be accurate to say that MIF is an SGML based tagging implementation?
> (I expect even FMs SGML implementation came later but broader SGML
> definitions were certainly in use earlier). Sometimes asking a silly question
> can be productive. Perhaps starting from an SGML highlighting
> basis might then be useful.
>
>
>
>
>
> Also, partial highlighting is better than no highlighting, at times.
>
>
>
>
>
> Thank you.
>
>
>
>
>
> Craig
>
>
> From: [email protected]
> To: [email protected]; [email protected]
> Subject: RE: What free Windows text editor should I use to look at MIF files?
> Date: Sun, 5 Oct 2014 12:25:40 -0400
>
>
>
>
> The article you cite is about the *Model* Interchange Format that relates to
> HL7, which Wikipedia tells me is a "set of international standards for
> transfer of clinical and administrative data between Hospital information
> systems". It has nothing whatsoever to do with the *Maker* Interchange Format
> that is used in FrameMaker other than the same acronym. MIF ≠ MIF in this
> case.
>
> And as I said, the highlighting you see may be useful, but it is an
> accidental artifact of MIF's use of angle brackets as delimiters.
>
> -Fred Ridder
>
> Date: Sun, 5 Oct 2014 18:50:57 +0300
> From: [email protected]
> To: [email protected]; [email protected]
> Subject: Re: What free Windows text editor should I use to look at MIF files?
>
>
>
>
>
>
> When I said that MIF was based on XML, I was taking that from this
> page:
>
> http://www.ringholm.com/docs/03060_en_HL7_MIF.htm
>
> "The Model Interchange Format (MIF) is a set of XML
> formats used to support the storage and exchange of HL7 version 3
> artefacts as part of the HL7 Development Framework."
>
> I'm really not an expert on MIF or XML, but the syntax highlighting
> in SciTE when I selected XML was much better than no highlighting at
> all.
>
>
>
> --
>
> Shmuel Wolfson
>
> Technical Writer
>
> 052-763-7133
>
>
>
>
>
> On 05-Oct-14 5:06 PM, Fred Ridder
> wrote:
>
>
>
>
> Sorry, Shmuel, but this is incorrect on a couple of
> levels.
>
>
>
> First of all, it's simply impossible for MIF to have been *based
> on* XML. MIF has existed since the very beginning of FrameMaker
> in 1986. XML, on the other hand, was initially defined (XML 1.0
> first edition) in 1998, 12 years after MIF was first included in
> a released product.?
>
>
>
> Second, the syntax may look similar, but the similarity extends
> no deeper than the use of angle brackets as delimiters.
>
> In MIF, both the property/parameter name and its value or values
> (which may themselves be bracket-delimited properties) are
> contained inside the brackets. The end of each element is marked
> by a simple right angle-bracket. This is not a problem in
> simple, single-value elements that begin and end on the same
> line; but to accommodate multi-line elements have multiple
> properties nested within it, it is necessary to include a
> commentary string that identifies what element is closed by the
> immediately preceding bracket since all brackets have identical
> appearance.
>
> In XML, on the other hand, the angle brackets only contain the
> name of the element type. The content (e.g., the value of the
> property or parameter) is *outside* the angle brackets,
> delimited by a bracketed start tag (e.g., ) and
> a corresponding explicitly named end tag (e.g.,
> ) .
>
>
>
> When your text editor highlights it as XML, it would highlight
> the opening angle bracket and parameter name string as if they
> were XML start tags. But the parameter values would not be
> highlighted because they appear in a location where XML does not
> allow text. Depending on your editor, numerical parameter values
> might be highlighted just because they are numerical. This
> degree of highlighting might be useful, but it is essentially
> accidental rather than by design.
>
>
>
> -Fred Ridder
>
>
>
> > From: [email protected]
>
> > To: [email protected]
>
> > Subject: Re: What free Windows text editor should I use
> to look at MIF files?
>
> >
>
> > MIF is based on XML, so select XML highlighting in the
> text editor. I
>
> > just tried it in SciTE and it looks good after selecting
> XML. It may
>
> > also work in NotePad++ but I didn't try it.
>
> >
>
> > --
>
> > Shmuel Wolfson
>
> > Technical Writer
>
> > 052-763-7133
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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