Learning the basics about XML is important in the successful use of XML on
TPF. Because XML is an evolving technology, any XML education that
could be provided here would most likely be out of date within a few
months. In addition, there are many resources available for learning
the detailed syntax of XML documents, DTDs, and the XML Schema
language. To find these resources, do a search on any Internet search
engine or browse the technology section of your local book store. You
will find many books, Web sites, and tools that will assist you in writing XML
documents. We have included a few book titles and Web pages in Resources that we found useful while porting the XML4C parser to
TPF. The list is by no means exhaustive, but provides you with a few
places to start.
The following list identifies the core pieces of XML that you should
understand before writing applications that use XML4C parser
3.5.1 on TPF:
- XML is Unicode 3.0 compliant.
- A schema is used to define the tags and structure of an XML
document. Two types of schema are (1) XML Schema ; and (2)
DTD.
- Note:
- XML Schema support in XML4C parser 3.5.1 is limited to a subset
of the W3C XML Schema language and is considered experimental at this
time. For more information about XML Schema support in this parser, go
to XML4C Version 3.5.1 Documentation.
- An XML namespace is simply a two-part naming system used for qualifying
element and attribute names used in an XML document.
- XML documents must be well-formed and may be valid based on an associated
DTD. Depending on the encoding used, you may be able to open your XML
document in Microsoft Internet Explorer Version 5.0 or later to see if
it is well-formed.
- XML documents contain elements and attributes.
- The parser specifications supported on TPF are DOM (versions 1.0
and 2.0) and SAX (versions 1.0 and 2.0). (The
experimental IDOM API is also available, but is not supported for production
work.)
- On TPF, the schema (DTD or XML Schema) must reside either in the XML
document or in the TPF file system. An XML document can reside in the
file system, reside in memory, or be passed through standard input
(stdin). See the following TPF books for more information about the TPF
file system:
XML on TPF: A Short Tutorial explores many of these topics and provides you with a sample
application that interacts with XML data.