computer-go: SGF alternatives

["Vlad Dumitrescu" <vladdu@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi all!

I know SGF is now a wide used standard and thus not very practical to change 
in a radical way, but what hit me this morning is that the tree structure 
and all the properties and information is perfectly suited to be stored in 
XML format.

Could it be interesting to create a defintion file (DTD) for a game 
description language? If not to replace SGF, then as an alternative...

Against XML:
- The obvious problem is that SGF is widely used and accepted;
- the files would be larger;

Pro XML:
- there are a lot of XML parsers available, and tools;
- it is a wider spread standard (generally speaking);
- standard technologies exist to define how to view XML documents 
(stylesheets);
- XML is easier to read by a human; (may be only a matter of habit)

Any thoughts?
(Before sending any flames: I am not against SGF, I think it is great! but 
exploring the options cannot be wrong...)
/Vlad

------
If anyone does not understand what XML is and can do, it is basically a 
language for marking up text in a structured way. A Go game might look 
something like:

<GAME>
 <KOMI value="5.5"/>
 <PLAYER color="white">
   <NAME> Takemyia Masaki </NAME>
   <RANK> 9d </RANK>
 </PLAYER>
 ...
 <PLAY>
   <MOVE color="black" where="pq" comment="interesting approach"/>
   <VARIATION>
     <MOVE color="black" where="pr" comment="better"/>
     ...
   </VARIATION>
 ...
 </PLAY>
</GAME>


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