[asterisk-users] Using XML for configuration management, single-source-of-truth, etc.

[Martin Smith]

> Try to implement '#include' and '#exec' in a sane way with XML.
> You can't just include one valid XML in another. You have to make a
> partial XML. And apitting it out is usually way more complicated.
> 
> Furthermore, there is the issue of partial processing: do you opt for
> one big XML file? Or continue with one XML file per .conf file?
> 

I'm pretty sure you can include one valid XML entity in another. This
functionality exists in SGML as well. I've seen it done both with parser
support and also simply defining your own &entity; (you can define an
entity in place or in another file somewhere else), which is relatively
easily, and then referring to that entity elsewhere in your document. I
found a nice IBM reference to using entities at
http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/xml/library/x-tipgentity.html.

In fact, I'd argue XML includes are more like the dialplan's idea of
inclusion when compared to includes in something like GCC.

:)

Martin Smith, Systems Developer
martins at bebr.ufl.edu
Bureau of Economic and Business Research
University of Florida
(352) 392-0171 Ext. 221