With this, I am beginning a series of posts on savings plan and XML. To set the tone for the debate, I would start with the basics of XML and the differences between XML and HTML.
What is XML?
XML is a markup language much like HTML. The primary use of XML to store, above, and information exchange. Being hardware independent software, has been widely accepted XML (W3C standard) as a means of exchanging information between disparate systems.
XML does not really do anything – it only structures, stores or sends information.
For example, this is a note stored as XML:
- <note>
- <to>LearnQTP</to>
- <from>Ankur Jain</from>
- <heading>XML</heading>
- <body>XML and QTP</body>
- </note>
The note has a header and a message body, sender and receiver of information. Data from the well-formed that, however, this XML document is nothing. Someone should write a piece of software to send, receive, display or interpretation.
Program that can handle plain text can also handle XML. In a simple text editor, XML tags will be visible. In an XML-aware application, however, XML tags can be handled in special (may or may not be visible, or have a functional significance).
XML vs HTML :
HTML describes the presentation. It is used to display data and focuses on how data looks. For example, in HTML, bibliography is the header, the remainder is in paragraphs with text in italics ...
- <h1> Bibliography </h1>
- <p> <i> Foundations of Databases </i>
- Abiteboul, Hull, Vianu
- <br> Addison Wesley, 1995
- <p> <i> Data on the Web </i>
- Abiteoul, Buneman, Suciu
- <br> Morgan Kaufmann, 1999
XML describes the content. It is used to describe the data and focuses on the data.
For example, in the XML below, the literature is a child element with books.
- <bibliography>
- <book> <title> Foundations… </title>
- <author> Abiteboul </author>
- <author> Hull </author>
- <author> Vianu </author>
- <publisher> Addison Wesley </publisher>
- <year> 1995 </year>
- </book>
- …
- </bibliography>
HTML can also use XML to store their data and focus on the presentation so that changes do not affect the data to HTML. In that sense, XML is a complement to HTML, not a replacement for it.
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