Top Rated Scripts | XML | Tutorials & Tips

This snippet demonstrates the all too common functionality of adding, modifying and deleting elements in an xml document. The demo page (see below) displays the xml before and after the actions.

This article describes how Perl can be used to transfer data between XML and relational databases, and how XML can bridge two disparate databases. MySQL is used as an example database.

This is another simple snippet that shows how to use XSLT and CSS on the client to format your XML data.

This application is a version of the well-known game of jeopardy that we use in our FlaDotNet.com .NET user group. Not only is it fun, but it demonstrates various techiques for processing XML and XSLT in .NET. It is definitely a great reference for learning how to access and transform your XML data in .NET

This is the first installment of "Working XML", a column with companion project code that demonstrates the evolution of full-fledged XML applications. This column introduces XM (XSLT Make), a simple and affordable Web publishing content-management solution that takes advantage of XML and XSLT. Code samples show the development of a wrapper for the XSLT to make it easy for a nonprogrammer to use. XM project code is available by link.

This introduction to XML presents the Extensible Markup Language at a reasonably technical level for anyone interested in learning more about structured documents. In addition to covering the XML 1.0 Specification, this article outlines related XML specifications, which are evolving. The article is organized in four main sections plus an appendix.

In this 28 page tutorial, you will go from not knowing much about XML/XSL/XPATH to finishing with a working knowledge of XSLT and XPATH.

The Darwin Information Typing Architecture (DITA) is an XML-based architecture for authoring, producing, and delivering technical information. This article introduces the architecture, which sets forth a set of design principles for creating information-typed modules at a topic level, and for using that content in delivery modes such as online help and product support portals on the Web. This article serves as a roadmap to DITA: what it is and how it applies to technical documentation. The article also links to representative source code.

This article shows how to use HTML as an intermediate language so that you can write a single stylesheet to translate from XML to one or more versions of HTML and use the features of the WebSphere Transcoding Publisher server to translate the resulting HTML to the target markup language the requesting device requires.

This article describes the design and implementation of an intuitive, fast and compact (40K) Java toolkit for parsing and manipulating XML -- Electric XML -- the XML engine of the author's company. It shows one way to apply object-oriented techniques to the creation of an XML parser, and it provides useful insight into API design. The source code for the non-validating parser described in this article may be downloaded and used freely for most commercial uses.

This article demonstrates how to automate e-mail publishing chores with Java and XML. This concrete application of XML and XSLT describes an e-mail newsletter (e-zine) publishing application that outputs both HTML and plain text e-mail messages. Five reusable code samples include a Java program to send e-mails using JavaMail, an XSLT style sheet to convert the DocBook sample introduced in Part 1 to HTML, a Java configuration handler (in the form of a SAX ContentHandler), and the Java code that puts it all together in a multistepped transformation.

This article casts a critical eye on the Simple Object Access Protocol, assessing the value this much-discussed new technology can provide developers and demonstrating its foundation in a mixture of the old RPC (remote procedure calls) technology and in XML. It examines RPC, XML-RPC, RMI, and SOAP in detail, comparing and contrasting the use of each, and discusses whether SOAP makes sense. This article also includes sample code for a SOAP envelope.

This article introduces the W3C's XQuery specification, currently winding its way toward Recommendation status after emerging from a long incubation period behind closed doors. The complex specification consists of six separate working drafts, with more to come. This article provides some background history, a road map into the documentation, and an overview of some of the technical issues involved in the specification. A sidebar takes a quick look at some key features of XQuery's surface syntax. Code samples demonstrate the difference between XQuery and XQueryX and show examples of the surface syntax.

This article presents a practical exploration of knowledge management with XML by illustrating techniques for populating Resource Description Framework (RDF) models with data from existing XML formats. As shown in the three code listings, RDF can be used as a companion to customized XML, not just as a canonical representation for certain types of data. This column, with code samples included, demonstrates how easy it can be to jump-start knowledge management with RDF even relatively late in the development game.

This XML guide explains XML uses, categories, elements and types of XML documents. XML structure, document type definition, element attributes, and extensible stylesheet language (XSL) is explained.

Ever want to know how to bridge processing of an HTML element over two XSLT templates? Here's why not to do it. This article demonstrates how to shift your thinking into the XSLT recursive approach, which is especially helpful if you have a background in a procedural language (Java and the like). Sample code demonstrates the right way (and the wrong way) to work with a flat XML or XHTML file that you want to process hierarchically.

XLink, an XML-related specification, lets you achieve dramatic linking effects in your XML documents. In this short tip learn how to include parts of other XML documents in your own XML through XLink. The code example demonstrates the technique.

This column demonstrates how to use XML Schema archetyping (and style sheets) to control styling of data for various presentation modes. Ten code samples in XML, XML Schema, and XSLT show how the techniques work to reduce code bulk and simplify maintenance.

This column takes a look at how to use XLink pointers when representing data to make XML documents more compact and flexible. Sample code shows examples of an invoice with and without the XLink pointers, plus an example of using XLinks with a URL-addressable database.

In this tutorial, selected XML features are demonstrated on many examples which can be downloaded for off-line use.