Don Box, like me, finally tells it like it is
It’s nice to see that even Don Box, who has grown up on Object orientation, application integration and database middleware gets it:
For better or worse, a significant amount of the world’s data is stored outside of relational DBMSs, specifically in Microsoft Word and Excel files. As these files move to an XML-based model, the idea of an XML store becomes increasingly compelling.
So much of the XML debate is about relational databases and application integration, all areas where good/adequate solutions exist today without XML. Its the unstructured documents, office documents, where the real issue and the real improvement is to be made. Lets see more focus and debate on this topic please. Its especially important now that the WinFS delayes may mean that Microsoft is no longer in the leadership role it once was.
