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Xmlbeans Index

Xmlbeans Index

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Ekta Parab
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41 views3 pages

Xmlbeans Index

Xmlbeans Index

Uploaded by

Ekta Parab
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Welcome to XMLBeans

1. Introduction to XMLBeans
XMLBeans is a tool that allows you to access the full power of XML in a Java friendly way.
It is an XML-Java binding tool. The idea is that you can take advantage the richness and
features of XML and XML Schema and have these features mapped as naturally as possible
to the equivalent Java language and typing constructs. XMLBeans uses XML Schema to
compile Java interfaces and classes that you can then use to access and modify XML instance
data. Using XMLBeans is similar to using any other Java interface/class, you will see things
like getFoo or setFoo just as you would expect when working with Java. While a major
use of XMLBeans is to access your XML instance data with strongly typed Java classes there
are also API's that allow you access to the full XML infoset (XMLBeans keeps full XML
Infoset fidelity) as well as to allow you to reflect into the XML schema itself through an
XML Schema Object model.
For more details on XMLBeans see the XMLBeans Explanation Wiki page. As well as the
XMLBeans documentation (see the Documentation tab on this website as well as the docs
directory in the XMLBeans Source).

1.1. What makes XMLBeans Different


There are at least two major things that make XMLBeans unique from other XML-Java
binding options.
1. Full XML Schema support. XMLBeans fully supports XML Schema and the
corresponding java classes provide constructs for all of the major functionality of XML
Schema. This is critical since often times you do not have control over the features of
XML Schema that you need to work with in Java. Also, XML Schema oriented
applications can take full advantage of the power of XML Schema and not have to
restrict themselvs to a subset.
2. Full XML Infoset fidelity.When unmarshalling an XML instance the full XML infoset
is kept and is available to the developer. This is critical because because of the subset of
XML that is not easily represented in java. For example, order of the elements or
comments might be needed in a particular application.
A major objective of XMLBeans has been to be applicable in all non-streaming (in memory)
XML programming situations. You should be able to compile your XML Schema into a set

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Copyright 2003 The Apache Software Foundation. All rights reserved.

Welcome to XMLBeans

of java classes and know that 1) you will be able to use XMLBeans for all of the schemas
you encounter (even the warped ones) and 2) that you will be able to get to the XML at
whatever level is necessary - and not have to resort to multple tools to do this.
To accomplish this XMLBeans provides three major APIs:
XmlObject The java classes that are generated from an XML Schema are all derived
from XmlObject. These provide strongly typed getters and setters for each of the
elements within the defined XML. Complex types are in turn XmlObjects. For example
getCustomer might return a CustomerType (which is an XmlObject). Simple types turn
into simple getters and setters with the correct java type. For example getName might
return a String.
XmlCursor From any XmlObject you can get an XmlCursor. This provides efficient,
low level access to the XML Infoset. A cursor represents a position in the XML instance.
You can move the cursor around the XML instance at any level of granularity you need
from individual characters to Tokens.
SchemaType XMLBeans provides a full XML Schema object model that you can use to
reflect on the underlying schema meta information. For example, you might want to
generate a sample XML instance for an XML schema or perhaps find the enumerations
for an element so that you can display them.
All of this was built with performance in mind. Informal benchmarks and user feedback
indicate that XMLBeans is extremely fast.
2. History
XMLBeans was submitted to Apache by BEA Systems in September 2003 and is currently in
the Apache incubation process. XMLBeans was originally created because of the need seen
by developers, in particular David Bau (David's about me post), need for a more XML
centric Java binding model that nothing on the market offered. XMLBeans 1.0 has been
successfully used as an underlying technology for several products as well as by a growing
number of large users including some of the largest companies in the world.
3. Future
The future of XMLBeans is exciting and you are invited to contribute. XMLBeans Version 1
is a great, stable technology that will continue to improve going forward. Its emphasis on full
support for XML Schema and the XML Infoset along with it's performance charactaristics
make it a great choice for in-memory XML-Java programming.
Work has begun on planning XMLBeans 2.0. At this point it appears that the major emphasis
for XMLBeans 2.0 are new use cases that expand the breadth of XMLBeans. The observation
is that XML-Java binding occurs in situations that XMLBeans could be optimized for, areas

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Copyright 2003 The Apache Software Foundation. All rights reserved.

Welcome to XMLBeans

such as Web Services (XMLBeans works well now in many Web Services situations) and
Java to XML Schema scenarios . See the XMLBeans Roadmap and the XMLBeans Feature
Plan wiki page for more information. XMLBeans is actively looking for contributors and
committers so, if you are interested, please join in.

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Copyright 2003 The Apache Software Foundation. All rights reserved.

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