Proceedings

Abstract

In principle the advantages of abstraction in programming are well understood. Yet daily interactions with everyday objects can lead us to confuse the concrete with the abstract, and think that the thing we are dealing with *is* the abstraction. Getting the right level of abstraction can have profound consequences. I believe that there are things we are struggling with today that are the consequences of a mistake in an abstraction made in the 1970's. This talk will be about data abstractions, and how we use them in XML applications, with a passing reference to the developments in XForms 2.0, and how declarative applications can make your life easier (or save you money, depending on who's doing the actual work).