I am taking a class for XML now and I really don’t understand a ‘real world’ application for it.
Does anyone use XML in the web development world?
If so, what for?
-
- Read about how logo jewelry can be used to reward and motivate employees.
-
Recent Posts
- The Methods That The IContact Service Could Help Assist In Website Promotion
- 3D Computer Monitors Rock! – Take Computer Gaming To Another Level
- Using IContact To Optimize The Effectiveness Of Your Email Marketing
- The Reasons Behind Why You Should Use An IContact Coupon Code
- Software Programmers Or Software Developers Are Required To Develop Applications For Various Purposes.
- Several Quick Tricks For Boosting Your Internet Site Web Optimization
- Small businesses now have affordable access to sophisticated online and mobile telephone systems at affordable prices. Check out the big daddy of the Virtual PBX category with this RingCentral Review.
Blogroll
6 Comments
XML is widespread, and is used everyday in a ton of web applications – you probably use them everyday without even knowing about it.
Examples:
- if you use feeds (blog, rss, atom, etc.) all of that has XML
- if you use a web site that offers Google Checkout, Paypal, the underlying technology is XML (integrated ones, not the button checkout stuff).
- if you’ve ever purchased something online, there’s a good chance XML is part of that process
- if you customize your yahoo page (my.yahoo.com) that’s XML
- if you customize your igoogle, microsoft live, pages, that’s XML
- your iTunes playlist is in XML
- see all those pages that have Google search on their web sites? That’s XML. Same with Live search, Yahoo search, etc. If you add that to your site, XML is in play.
- if you want to integrate with UPS, FedEx, the US Postal service systems, that’s all XML
- if you want to integrate with Amazon…you get the drift.
and a LOT more. You can go on forever with the biggest and most successful production level deployments out there using XML (in part or whole).
The reason you don’t "see" XML is because it’s in the "plumbing" part. All you see is the result of all the XML plumbing. So if you’re familiar with programming, XML lives in the data layer (largely hidden), and is used to create the presentation layer (what you actually see on screen).
XML can live in the presentation layer as well – but that’s the part of XML that I don’t know how widespread it is. I don’t use XML in this fashion in any of my production deployments…but that doesn’t mean nobody does.
XML is an easy way of reusing data across different systems. So instead of some "heavy" stuff like database systems, it’s easier/safer/more portable to share data via XML. You can even say that this whole notion of "Web 2.0", social networks, etc., etc., is largely XML driven.
YES. XML is everywhere. Most programmers view this as a bad thing, but it’s there anyway.
What XML helps (?) you do is separate data from display. Suppose you want to put stock quotes on your website. You (or someone else) writes a program that takes a stock symbol, gets the price, returns it. These services really exist. Now, remember, you’re putting it on YOUR website. How are you going to do that?
If they return HTML as the stock quote, the service works for you, but not for anyone else. It would have your website’s formatting in it, after all. That means everybody needs to write a stock retrieval service, what a pain.
If they return plain-text, it’s what programmers call "brittle" or "frail" – everyone has to know how to parse the plain text (in case one day you want to add the 52-week high and low, for instance) and everyone has to change their code if your plain text structure changes.
With XML, everyone uses a pre-built parser to parse the XML, and then grabs the elements they are interested in. You might only be interested in the price. Some other developer, only the 52-week high. Neither one of you has to pay attention to any of the parts they don’t care about.
I’m just done looking through your article and I fairly liked it. XML – any real world application? | Learn XML is awesome! I had a couple of questions in the beginning of the posting though, but I kept on reading and I am glad I did. Fine amusing submit, blogger! Continue posting and I’ll surely be returning soon. Many thanks and best regards.
Evenin’, I appreciated your article here at XML – any real world application? | Learn XML but I am definitely not loving the theme. Is it a regular style or some thing? Take care and keep up posting!
I’m really enjoying the design and layout of your website. It’s a very easy on the eyes which makes it much more enjoyable for me to come here and visit more often. Did you hire out a designer to create your theme? Fantastic work!
Hands down, Apple’s app store wins by a mile. It’s a huge selection of all sorts of apps vs a rather sad selection of a handful for Zune. Microsoft has plans, especially in the realm of games, but I’m not sure I’d want to bet on the future if this aspect is important to you. The iPod is a much better choice in that case.
Post a Comment