> To add to the madness you can write XML files that translate XML files to
> other files (possibly other XML files) in an XML defined language called
> XSLT.  XSLT is a bit like writing in a functional programming language with
> the worst syntax possible :-).
>
> The reason I say "worst syntax possible" is that the amount of typing
> you'll do to express something simple in XML is pretty excessive.
>

You could also use XQuery, which has syntax that functional programmers are
used to, but lacks the semantic features you'd want in such a language. I
remember I asked one of the MarkLogic XQuery implementation team members
about HOF & TCO in the latest version of MarkLogic Server. I was told that
TCO isn't on the radar for them, and if you want HOF, uses strings + eval.
le sigh.

--
And in the "Only Prolog programmers will find this funny" department:

Q: How many Prolog programmers does it take to change a lightbulb?

A: No.
 -- Ovid

   "By cosmic rule, as day yields night, so winter summer, war peace, plenty
famine. All things change. Air penetrates the lump of myrrh, until the
joining bodies die and rise again in smoke called incense."

   "Men do not know how that which is drawn in different directions
harmonises with itself. The harmonious structure of the world depends upon
opposite tension like that of the bow and the lyre."

   "This universe, which is the same for all, has not been made by any god
or man, but it always has been, is, and will be an ever-living fire,
kindling itself by regular measures and going out by regular measures"
-- Heraclitus