xmlhack: XSLT, XPath, and XQuery drafts

The W3C has given developers a huge pile of holiday reading, with first drafts of XSLT 2.0 and XPath 2.0, as well as a collection of revised query drafts.

The XSLT draft makes clear its early status:

"is published in order to provide the XSLT user community with a preview of the revised language specification, and to obtain feedback.... While prototype implementations are encouraged, users and vendors are advised that this working draft cannot be regarded as a stable specification."

A change log details revisions since XSLT 1.0. XPath 2.0 lacks a change log, but does have a list of compatibility issues. XPath 2.0 is the result of joint work between the Query and XSL working groups, changing its flavor:

"This document is the result of joint work by the XSL and XML Query Working Groups, which are jointly responsible for XPath 2.0, a language derived from both XPath 1.0 and XQuery. The XPath 2.0 and XQuery 1.0 Working Drafts are generated from a common source. These languages are closely related, sharing much of the same expression syntax and semantics, and much of the text found in the two Working Drafts is identical. The current version of this document is the first publicly released Working Draft containing the results of integrating these languages."

On the query side, the W3C has published revised versions of four documents: