Generalised invisible markup

Invisible XML makes the implicit structure of textual documents explicit by parsing, and then transforming the resultant parse-tree into an abstract document. This abstract document is the essence of Invisible XML: it can be processed in many ways, though principally by serialising to XML.

However, as shown in an earlier paper on roundtripping ixml, it is possible to simultaneously simplify and generalise the ixml serialisation process, thereby opening it to other serialisations that are not hard-wired in the processor. By the same token, this further simplifies ixml proper, by reducing it to a simple transformation of grammars from ixml to an equivalent Invisible Markup grammar.

This paper investigates the changes needed to create an Invisible Markup Language, investigates the alternatives, and proposes future steps.