> > > From what I understand with regard to Fortran standards, if you want a > > > copy of the standard, you have to pay a substantial sum to ISO. > > > > that sounds like a reasonable fine for those using Fortran. > > Well, it applies to ALL standards. as i said, it's terribly rare for sensible people to buy from iso. what's more, if iso ever does get involved in xml/xsl standardisation (and it would require a serious access of sanity in the relevant committees for this to happen) i wouldn't be at all surprised if the resulting standard appeared on the web. there's a precedent: vrml, which was once being touted as a serious part of the web, is iso-standardised and the iso standard is available from the web. > > you also have to buy newspapers and books and electricity and food. > > Yes, of course, I have no problem with this in principle (I use VMS not > linux and don't mind paying for the work someone has done). However, if > one USEs a standard, in practice one would need a copy, so it's either > pay money or do it illegally. this is of course tosh. i used to write standard fortran all the time, once, long ago. i had a little note (written by someone who knew) which told me which of the extensions available i should avoid. i have never read a fortran standard: fortran standards, by and large, are only of use to people writing fortran compilers. similarly, many sensible people write entirely reasonable latex on the basis of the `not so short intro' rather than the supposedly definitive lamport book. i have little doubt that similar documents are going to spring up in the xml world, if they don't already exist... r