Oreilly learning xml

Learning XML

Erik T. Ray

First Edition, January 2001 ISBN: 0-59600-046-4, 368 pages

XML (Extensible Markup Language) is a flexible way to create "self-describing data" and to share both the format and the data on the World Wide Web, intranets, and elsewhere. In Learning XML, the author explains XML and its capabilities succinctly and professionally, with references to real-life projectsand other cogent examples. Learning XML shows the purpose of XML markup itself, the CSS and XSL styling languages, and the XLink and XPointer specifications for creating rich link structures.

Preface What's Inside Style Conventions Examples Comments and Questions Acknowledgments 1 Introduction 1.1 What Is XML ? 1.2 Origins of XML 1.3 Goals of XML 1.4 XML Today 1.5 Creating Documents 1.6Viewing XML 1.7 Testing XML 1.8 Transformation Markup and Core Concepts 2.1 The Anatomy of a Document 2.2 Elements: The Building Blocks of XML 2.3 Attributes: More Muscle for Elements 2.4 Namespaces: Expanding Your Vocabulary 2.5 Entities: Placeholders for Content 2.6 Miscellaneous Markup 2.7 Well-Formed Documents 2.8 Getting the Most out of Markup 2.9 XML Application: DocBook Connecting Resources withLinks 3.1 Introduction 3.2 Specifying Resources 3.3 XPointer: An XML Tree Climber 3.4 An Introduction to XLinks 3.5 XML Application: XHTML Presentation: Creating the End Product 4.1 Why Stylesheets? 4.2 An Overview of CSS 4.3 Rules 4.4 Properties 4.5 A Practical Example Document Models: A Higher Level of Control 5.1 Modeling Documents 5.2 DTD Syntax 5.3 Example: A Checkbook 5.4 Tips for Designingand Customizing DTD s 5.5 Example: Barebones DocBook 5.6 XML Schema: An Alternative to DTD s Transformation: Repurposing Documents 6.1 Transformation Basics 6.2 Selecting Nodes 6.3 Fine-Tuning Templates 6.4 Sorting 6.5 Example: Checkbook 6.6 Advanced Techniques 6.7 Example: Barebones DocBook Internationalization 7.1 Character Sets and Encodings 7.2 Taking Language into Account Programming for XML8.1 XML Programming Overview 8.2 SAX: An Event-Based API 8.3 Tree-Based Processing 8.4 Conclusion

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Resources A.1 Online A.2 Books A.3 Standards Organizations A.4 Tools A.5 Miscellaneous A Taxonomy of Standards B.1 Markup and Structure B.2 Linking B.3 Searching B.4 Style and Transformation B.5Programming B.6 Publishing B.7 Hypertext B.8 Descriptive/Procedural B.9 Multimedia B.10 Science Glossary Colophon

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The arrival of support for XML - the Extensible Markup Language - in browsers and authoring tools has followed a long period of intense hype. Major databases, authoring tools (including Microsoft's Office 2000), and browsers are committed to XML support. Manycontent creators and programmers for the Web and other media are left wondering, "What can XML and its associated standards really do for me?" Getting the most from XML requires being able to tag and transform XML documents so they can be processed by web browsers, databases, mobile phones, printers, XML processors, voice response systems, and LDAP directories, just to name a few targets. InLearning XML, the author explains XML and its capabilities succinctly and professionally, with references to real-life projects and other cogent examples. Learning XML shows the purpose of XML markup itself, the CSS and XSL styling languages, and the XLink and XPointer specifications for creating rich link structures. The basic advantages of XML over HTML are that XML lets a web designer define tagsthat are meaningful for the particular documents or database output to be used, and that it enforces an unambiguous structure that supports error-checking. XML supports enhanced styling and linking standards (allowing, for instance, simultaneous linking to the same document in multiple languages) and a range of new applications. For writers producing XML documents, this book demystifies files and...