Resources for journalists, writers, producers, and conference organizers |
Thanks for your interest in my work. I hope the resources I've assembled here will make your job easier. Please feel free to contact me directly if there is anything else you need, such as review copies of books or prize copies for promotions.
Ed Mosher, Ray Lorie, and I invented the first structured markup language in 1969, IBM's "Generalized Markup Language" (GML). In 1970 I coined the phrase "markup language" in order to describe our invention.
GML led to SGML, which I invented in 1974. SGML literally makes the infrastructure of modern society possible. Our incredibly complex systems and products require massive amounts of documentation -- 4 million pages for a single model of aircraft, for example, which must be updated quarterly. That documentation couldn't be created and managed without SGML.
The same is true for the documentation of nuclear plants, oil rigs, government laws and regulations, military systems -- and anything else that is too complex for a single person to understand and that has life-and-death significance. All of those things are documented with SGML.
The World Wide Web is also powered by SGML. Earlier this year the Society for Technical Communication recognized that synergy by conferring Honorary Fellowships on both Tim Berners-Lee and myself. It was the only dual award since 1974, when Buckminster Fuller and Frank Winship received the first two Honorary Fellowships.
HTML is an SGML application, while XML is a Web-optimized subset of SGML. For a quick and clear explanation of XML, read XML in an Instant: A Non-geeky Introduction.
You can also read my bio, and access mini and micro versions for sidebars and conference programs.
For further background, check out the SGML History Niche and the interviews below.
My book, The XML Handbook™, has its own website and press kit.
The best interviews ask really perceptive and interesting questions. I've collected a few here that provide helpful insights into XML and markup languages and their impact on the Web and the world. You may be surprised at how much society depends on structured markup.
These are mostly 512x768 JPEGs. High resolution TIFFs are also available, as is a larger selection of photos. Let me know what you need.
For convience, here are smaller versions of the same images, about 100x140 JPEGs.
To Charles F. Goldfarb's SGML Source Home Page.
To The XML Handbook™ press kit.
Copyright ©1999 Charles F. Goldfarb. All rights reserved. Information on this site cannot be used or cited for any commercial purpose, although links to the site are welcome. Any questions, comments, or suggestions? Send me mail.
