[Biojava-l] StAX APIs

[Thomas Down]

Hi...

I've been puzzling for a few weeks now over what to do with
the StAX APIs.  These are currently living in the BioJava tree,
but:

  - They have absolutely no connection with Biology.  And not
    even that much with Java (the concept could be easily 
    re-implemented in many other languages, just as SAX has
    been).

  - My own experience, plus that of the other people around here
    who have used StAX, suggests that the API could be quite
    widely useful.  I'd like to be able to present it to the
    world without tying it to the rest of BioJava.

I've therefore created a project on Sourceforge:

  http://sourceforge.net/projects/stax/

This is going to be the new home of StAX, plus a few other
bits of XML-related code I'm working on (notably a StAX-based
SOAP library).  There'll be a mailing list there, plus a CVS
repository.  Needless to say, everyone is welcome...

What does this mean for BioJava?

This probably means that we'll want to add an extra dependancy,
(stax.jar) to the BioJava project, sitting alongside our existing
requirement for an XML parser.  It'll be a tiny .jar file, and
we can hold a copy in the CVS tree, like we do for all our current
dependancies.

The alternative would be to keep the StAX code mirrored in the
BioJava tree.  StAX is small enough that this is technically
feasible.  But it sounds like asking for trouble to me...

Any thoughts?

   Thomas.