XMLVS: Using Namespace Documents for XML Versioning

As XML becomes ubiquitous and mature, the problem of versioning is increasingly significant. While XML itself has a clear versioning scheme through the version attribute in the prolog, XML-based languages such as Atom do not have a standardized versioning mechanism. We propose namespace documents as the logical solution. It could be claimed that such an approach is not needed by current markup practice in XML. However, as shown by the recent confusion the introduction of the xml:id name caused, at least seems some clarification of the gap between what W3C Recommendations actually define about namespaces and what many people think they define (as well as W3C good practice) is in order. Once we understand namespaces, XMLVS shows that the namespace document is both an effective and practical solution for maintaining XML languages. The XML-based language XMLVS (XML Versioning System) makes the maintaining, documenting, and versioning of XML languages easier by automatically producing best-practice human and machine-readable namespace documents for XML languages.