I don't think it is a big problem. The other way round I had to check all over the place that symbols are created before requested as name at the xml classes. In gemstone it is even the case that #key->'value' creates an object of class SymbolAssociation and testing equality is checking for class identity as well (unlike isKindOf: in squeak/pharo). It took me a while to solve some of the failing tests just because of this. While my feeling tells me that symbols would be the appropriate thing to use it seems they are just to troublesome. Regarding the "shortlivedness" of a DOM the effort of converting to symbols is hard to justify.
I'm planning to incorporate the latest changes by next week. I'll start complaining if I hit another wall.
Sure, no problem
thanks for your work (and the tests!)
I plan to integrate the one Michael sent me. I hope to do it soon.
Alexandre