Danny Ayers left a comment about my earlier post: 

I am still puzzled why anyone might actually prefer to do things like link lists/trees or structured documents in OPML rather than HTML.

It's the tools. And the buzz, too, but mostly the tools.

It's not just the OPML Editor; the OPML browsers, I confess, are part of the reason, too.

When users see how dead simple it is to create an OPML file with the OPML Editor, then see a slick representation of that data in a medium they're used to (i.e., the web browser), it's only natural that they start thinking up other things they can do with these tools.

Analogy: Think about all the things you can accomplish with just a hammer and a pair of pliers (or a good rock, for that matter) for which there are better, more specialized tools.

But I like OPML and the things I can do with it.

I'm rather amused at the notion of using OPML as a native file format in a CMS. [snip]...it sounds like tying your shoeslaces together before going for a walk...

This would seem strange if you're expecting an über-format. However, if you're writing the CMS, and you always know what the OPML is going to represent and contain, then there really isn't any trick to it. (Well, I'm sure Dave has plenty of tricks, but dealing with HTML vs. XHTML is not one of them.) Think about what Rael Dornfest did with blosxom, which was created out of nothing more than a perl script and some plain text files. Of course you can create a CMS with OPML as the native file format!

Here's what I deleted yesterday: 

I must be a blazing idiot 

I had an email conversation with Adam Green on Thursday about OPML as a format, during the course of which I went into a diatribe about the relevance/importance of OPML browsers, some of which have been getting quite a bit of publicity lately (like, Grazr and Bitty Browser, the latter of which really is more of an embeddable web browser that understands and renderes OPML and RSS), and one of which I wrote (Optimal).

Regarding OPML as a format, I asserted that a lot of the current hoopla about OPML is misplaced. Like the existing animosity, the new excitement about OPML seems to stem from people wanting to do things with OPML that it's not very good at and for which good alternatives often exist. Like playlists.

More important than the fact that OPML may not be a good format for a particular use is that the end use always seems to be to render the information in HTML, a la Grazr, Bitty, OPod, Optimal, etc. I just don't get why anyone would want to transform their information from a format designed for it INTO a format that's not designed for it only to then transform it AGAIN INTO HTML. Haven't they ever played with Babelfish? English-to-Japanese-to-French may be fun, but it's not a very accurate translation.

I'm not down on OPML, mind you. I'm just non-phased by most of the ideas I've heard dreamt up to take advantage of the ability to use namespaces in OPML 2.0 and perplexed by the excitement over OPML browsers.

The ideas that take advantage of the ability to use namespaces are not all bad. Some of them are amazing. The thing is, OPML has taken on this buzzword quality that may be distracting from its core strengths. Reading lists are the killer application of OPML, but only two news aggregators are capable of subscribing to OPML reading lists. (On the other hand, Nick Bradbury's idea to weave attention data into OPML is brilliant.)

Dave modestly says that Scripting News is just an OPML browser, but that's an oversimplification. Scripting News is a content management system that uses OPML as its native file format. In that context, having an OPML browser is important, and it makes sense.

And when you've already got an OPML file, OPML browsers can help people visualize the contents and structure of the OPML. "Here's my blogroll." "Here's a cool reading list." "Here are my show notes for the podcast." "Here's my time and responsibility schedule for the project." These are applications for which OPML is an ideal data interchange format. Then if someone doesn't have an outlining tool like the OPML Editor, at least he can view the file in an OPML browser.

So OPML browsers are not irrelevant, but the buzz-o-meter on OPML browsers is off the charts right now. Even Danny Ayers appears to be on the bandwagon, and I felt like I was channeling Danny above.

Like I said, I must be a blazing idiot.

Your comments are welcome.