[xquery-talk] A doc()-map chain operator proposal

[Michael Kay]

I think it would be quite inappropriate for any function or operator in XPath to attach special meaning to attribute of a particular name, such as @href. The only way it would make sense would be is if there’s a W3C defining the semantics of the attribute - e.g. @xlink:href - but almost no-one uses that. 

> 
> Because it would be a shame to add it in an implementation, and then get XQuery 4, where there is a ~ operator that does something completely different.
> 

Indeed, that is why XQuery does not allow a conformant implementation to add its own operators.

Michael Kay
Saxonica