Workflow to ensure users write valid EML? about eml HOT 3 CLOSED

@cboettig One potential source of validation errors that you may not have considered is the use of illegal XML characters in the user input. Before you write out the XML, all illegal XML chanracters need to be escaped. Does your S4 class handle this escaping automatically when moving data in and out of R data structures?

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Yes, it looks like the R XML library automatically escapes these characters. (Noticed this somewhat by accident in my example from the README: https://github.com/ropensci/reml/blob/70c1f8b2747515ae32b770007c84c905f1fda3d3/inst/doc/reml_example.xml

I added an html-marked up link for intellectual rights, which you will see escaped there. (How would you suggest that section be marked up properly to include a link to the relevant license? Or should I just stick in the whole license text?

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I think we aim for a two-fold strategy: (1) mostly to provide constructor functions for which it is difficult to make invalid EML, while still supporting direct construction for advanced users, and then (2) wrap the validation check in the "publish" functions (with toggle off option), but not wrap it in the regular "write" functions. We also expose the validation function for end-users to run it themselves if they wish. (Re-tagging question as "publish" instead of "write").

To Do:

• Add validation check to publish functions

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