3236-7 ch02.F.

qc 6/29/99 1:03 PM Page 17

An Introduction
to XML
2
C H A P T E R

✦ ✦ ✦ ✦

Applications In This Chapter

What is an XML
application?

I
XML for XML
n this chapter we’ll be looking at some examples of XML
applications, markup languages used to further refine XML, Behind-the-scene
and behind-the-scene uses of XML. It is inspiring to look at uses of XML
some of the uses to which XML has already been put, even in
this early stage of its development. This chapter will give you ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦
some idea of the wide applicability of XML. Many more XML
applications are being created or ported from other formats
as I write this.

Cross- Part V covers some of the XML applications discussed in

Reference this chapter in more detail.

What Is an XML Application?

XML is a meta-markup language for designing domain-specific
markup languages. Each XML-based markup language is called
an XML application. This is not an application that uses XML
like the Mozilla Web browser, the Gnumeric spreadsheet, or
the XML Pro editor, but rather an application of XML to a
specific domain such as Chemical Markup Language (CML) for
chemistry or GedML for genealogy.

Each XML application has its own syntax and vocabulary. This
syntax and vocabulary adheres to the fundamental rules of
XML. This is much like human languages, which each have
their own vocabulary and grammar, while at the same time
adhering to certain fundamental rules imposed by human
anatomy and the structure of the brain.
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18 Part I ✦ Introducing XML

XML is an extremely flexible format for text-based data. The reason XML was
chosen as the foundation for the wildly different applications discussed in this
chapter (aside from the hype factor) is that XML provides a sensible, well-
documented format that’s easy to read and write. By using this format for its data, a
program can offload a great quantity of detailed processing to a few standard free
tools and libraries. Furthermore, it’s easy for such a program to layer additional
levels of syntax and semantics on top of the basic structure XML provides.

Chemical Markup Language

Peter Murray-Rust’s Chemical Markup Language (CML) may have been the first
XML application. CML was originally developed as an SGML application, and
gradually transitioned to XML as the XML standard developed. In its most
simplistic form, CML is “HTML plus molecules”, but it has applications far beyond
the limited confines of the Web.

Molecular documents often contain thousands of different, very detailed objects.

For example, a single medium-sized organic molecule may contain hundreds of
atoms, each with several bonds. CML seeks to organize these complex chemical
objects in a straightforward manner that can be understood, displayed, and
searched by a computer. CML can be used for molecular structures and sequences,
spectrographic analysis, crystallography, publishing, chemical databases, and
more. Its vocabulary includes molecules, atoms, bonds, crystals, formulas,
sequences, symmetries, reactions, and other chemistry terms. For instance Listing
2-1 is a basic CML document for water (H2O):

Listing 2-1: The water molecule H2O

<?xml version=”1.0”?>
<CML>
<MOL TITLE=”Water”>
<ATOMS>
<ARRAY BUILTIN=”ELSYM”>H O H</ARRAY>
</ATOMS>
<BONDS>
<ARRAY BUILTIN=”ATID1”>1 2</ARRAY>
<ARRAY BUILTIN=”ATID2”>2 3</ARRAY>
<ARRAY BUILTIN=”ORDER”>1 1</ARRAY>
</BONDS>
</MOL>
</CML>

The biggest improvement CML offers over traditional approaches to managing

chemical data is ease of searching. CML also enables complex molecular data to be
sent over the Web. Because the underlying XML is platform-independent, the
problem of platform-dependency that plagues the binary formats used by
3236-7 ch02.F.qc 6/29/99 1:03 PM Page 19

Chapter 2 ✦ An Introduction to XML Applications 19

traditional chemical software and documents like the Protein Data Bank (PDB)
format or MDL Molfiles, is avoided.

Murray-Rust also created JUMBO, the first general-purpose XML browser. Figure 2-1
shows JUMBO displaying a CML file. Jumbo works by assigning each XML element to
a Java class that knows how to render that element. To allow Jumbo to support new
elements, you simply write Java classes for those elements. Jumbo is distributed
with classes for displaying the basic set of CML elements including molecules,
atoms, and bonds, and is available at http://www.xml-cml.org/.

Figure 2-1: The JUMBO browser displaying a CML file

Mathematical Markup Language

Legend claims that Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web and HTML
at CERN so that high-energy physicists could exchange papers and preprints.
Personally I’ve never believed that. I grew up in physics; and while I’ve wandered
back and forth between physics, applied math, astronomy, and computer science
over the years, one thing the papers in all of these disciplines had in common was
lots and lots of equations. Until now, nine years after the Web was invented, there
hasn’t been any good way to include equations in Web pages.

There have been a few hacks — Java applets that parse a custom syntax, converters
that turn LaTeX equations into GIF images, custom browsers that read TeX files —
but none of these have produced high quality results, and none of them have
caught on with Web authors, even in scientific fields. Finally, XML is starting to
change this.
3236-7 ch02.F.qc 6/29/99 1:03 PM Page 20

20 Part I ✦ Introducing XML

The Mathematical Markup Language (MathML) is an XML application for

mathematical equations. MathML is sufficiently expressive to handle pretty
much all forms of math — from grammar-school arithmetic through calculus
and differential equations. It can handle many considerably more advanced
topics as well, though there are definite gaps in some of the more advanced
and obscure notations used by certain sub-fields of mathematics. While there
are limits to MathML on the high end of pure mathematics and theoretical
physics, it is eloquent enough to handle almost all educational, scientific,
engineering, business, economics, and statistics needs. And MathML is likely
to be expanded in the future, so even the purest of the pure mathematicians
and the most theoretical of the theoretical physicists will be able to publish
and do research on the Web. MathML completes the development of the Web
into a serious tool for scientific research and communication (despite its long
digression to make it suitable as a new medium for advertising brochures).

Netscape Navigator and Internet Explorer do not yet support MathML. Nonetheless,
it is the fervent hope of many mathematicians that they soon will. The W3C has
integrated some MathML support into their test-bed browser, Amaya. Figure 2-2
shows Amaya displaying the covariant form of Maxwell’s equations written in
MathML.

On the Amaya is on the CD-ROM in the browsers/amaya directory.

CD-ROM

Figure 2-2: The Amaya browser displaying the

covariant form of Maxwell’s equations written
in MathML

The XML file the Amaya browser is displaying is given in Listing 2-2:

Listing 2-2: Maxwell’s Equations in MathML

<?xml version=”1.0”?>
<html xmlns=”http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40”
xmlns:m=”http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-MathML/”
>
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Chapter 2 ✦ An Introduction to XML Applications 21

<head>
<title>Fiat Lux</title>
<meta name=”GENERATOR” content=”amaya V1.3b” />
</head>
<body>

<P>
And God said,
</P>

<math>
<m:mrow>
<m:msub>
<m:mi>&delta;</m:mi>
<m:mi>&alpha;</m:mi>
</m:msub>
<m:msup>
<m:mi>F</m:mi>
<m:mi>&alpha;&beta;</m:mi>
</m:msup>
<m:mi></m:mi>
<m:mo>=</m:mo>
<m:mi></m:mi>
<m:mfrac>
<m:mrow>
<m:mn>4</m:mn>
<m:mi>&pi;</m:mi>
</m:mrow>
<m:mi>c</m:mi>
</m:mfrac>
<m:mi></m:mi>
<m:msup>
<m:mi>J</m:mi>
<m:mrow>
<m:mi>&beta;</m:mi>
<m:mo></m:mo>
</m:mrow>
</m:msup>
</m:mrow>
</math>

<P>
and there was light
</P>
</body>
</html>

Listing 2-2 is an example of a mixed HTML/XML page. The headers and paragraphs
of text (“Fiat Lux”, “Maxwell’s Equations”, “And God said”, “and there was light”) is
given in classic HTML. The actual equations are written in MathML, an application
of XML.
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22 Part I ✦ Introducing XML

In general, such mixed pages require special support from the browser, as is the
case here, or perhaps plug-ins, ActiveX controls, or JavaScript programs that parse
and display the embedded XML data. Ultimately, of course, you want a browser like
Mozilla 5.0 or Internet Explorer 5.0 that can parse and display pure XML files
without an HTML intermediary.

Channel Definition Format

Microsoft’s Channel Definition Format (CDF) is an XML application for defining
channels. Web sites use channels to upload information to readers who subscribe
to the site rather than waiting for them to come and get it. This is alternately called
Webcasting or push. CDF was first introduced in Internet Explorer 4.0.

A CDF document is an XML file, separate from, but linked to an HTML document on
the site being pushed. The channel defined in the CDF document determines which
pages are sent to the readers, how the pages are transported, and how often the
pages are sent. Pages can either be pushed by sending notifications, or even whole
Web sites, to subscribers; or pulled down by the readers at their convenience.

You can add CDF to your site without changing any of the existing content.
You simply add an invisible link to a CDF file on your home page. Then when
a reader visits the page, the browser displays a dialog box asking them if they
want to subscribe to the channel. If the reader chooses to subscribe, the browser
downloads a copy of the CDF document describing the channel. The browser
then combines the parameters specified in the CDF document with the user’s
own preferences to determine when to check back with the server for new con-
tent. This isn’t true push, because the client has to initiate the connection, but
it still happens without an explicit request by the reader. Figure 2-3 shows the
IDG Active Channel in Internet Explorer 4.0.

Cross- CDF is covered in more detail in Chapter 21, Pushing Web Sites with CDF.
Reference

On the Internet Explorer 4.0 is on the CD-ROM in the browsers/ie4 directory.

CD-ROM

Classic Literature
Jon Bosak has translated the complete plays of Shakespeare into XML. The
complete text of the plays is included, and XML markup is used to distinguish
between titles, subtitles, stage directions, speeches, lines, speakers, and more.

On the The complete set of plays is on the CD-ROM in the examples/shakespeare

CD-ROM directory.
3236-7 ch02.F.qc 6/29/99 1:03 PM Page 23

Chapter 2 ✦ An Introduction to XML Applications 23

Figure 2-3: The IDG Active Channel in Internet Explorer 4.0

You may ask yourself what this offers over a book, or even a plain text file. To a
human reader, the answer is not much. But to a computer doing textual analysis,
it offers the opportunity to easily distinguish between the different elements into
which the plays have been divided. For instance, it makes it quite simple for the
computer to go through the text and extract all of Romeo’s lines.

Furthermore, by altering the style sheet with which the document is formatted,
an actor could easily print a version of the document in which all their lines were
formatted in bold face, and the lines immediately before and after theirs were
italicized. Anything else you might imagine that requires separating a play into the
lines uttered by different speakers is much more easily accomplished with the XML-
formatted versions than with the raw text.

Bosak has also marked up English translations of the old and new testaments, the
Koran, and the Book of Mormon in XML. The markup in these is a little different.
For instance, it doesn’t distinguish between speakers. Thus you couldn’t use these
particular XML documents to create a red-letter Bible, for example, although a
different set of tags might allow you to do that. (A red-letter Bible prints words
spoken by Jesus in red.) And because these files are in English rather than the
original languages, they are not as useful for scholarly textual analysis. Still, time
and resources permitting, those are exactly the sorts of things XML would allow
you to do if you wanted to. You’d simply need to invent a different vocabulary and
syntax than the one Bosak used that would still describe the same data.
3236-7 ch02.F.qc 6/29/99 1:03 PM Page 24

24 Part I ✦ Introducing XML

On the The XML-ized Bible, Koran, and Book of Mormon are all on the CD-ROM in the
CD-ROM examples/religion directory.

Synchronized Multimedia Integration Language

The Synchronized Multimedia Integration Language (SMIL, pronounced “smile”) is a
W3C recommended XML application for writing “TV-like” multimedia presentations
for the Web. SMIL documents don’t describe the actual multimedia content (that is
the video and sound that are played) but rather when and where they are played.

For instance, a typical SMIL document for a film festival might say that the browser
should simultaneously play the sound file beethoven9.mid, show the video file
corange.mov, and display the HTML file clockwork.htm. Then, when it’s done, it
should play the video file 2001.mov, the audio file zarathustra.mid, and display the
HTML file aclarke.htm. This eliminates the need to embed low bandwidth data like
text in high bandwidth data like video just to combine them. Listing 2-3 is a simple
SMIL file that does exactly this.

Listing 2-3: A SMIL film festival

<?xml version=”1.0” encoding=”ISO-8859-1”?>
<!DOCTYPE smil PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD SMIL 1.0//EN”
“http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-smil/SMIL10.dtd”>
<smil>
<body>
<seq id=”Kubrick”>
<audio src=”beethoven9.mid”/>
<video src=”corange.mov”/>
<text src=”clockwork.htm”/>
<audio src=”zarathustra.mid”/>
<video src=”2001.mov”/>
<text src=”aclarke.htm”/>
</seq>
</body>
</smil>

Furthermore, as well as specifying the time sequencing of data, a SMIL document

can position individual graphics elements on the display and attach links to media
objects. For instance, at the same time the movie and sound are playing, the text of
the respective novels could be subtitling the presentation.
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Chapter 2 ✦ An Introduction to XML Applications 25

HTML+TIME
SMIL operates independently of the Web page. The streaming media pushed
through SMIL has its own pane in the browser frame, but it doesn’t really
have any interaction with the content in the HTML on the rest of the page. For
instance, SMIL only lets you time SMIL elements like audio, video, and text. It
doesn’t let you add timing information to basic HTML tags like <P>, <LI>, or <IMG>.
And SMIL duplicates some aspects of HTML, such as how elements are positioned
on the page.

Microsoft, along with Macromedia and Compaq, has proposed a semi-competing

XML application called Timed Interactive Multimedia Extensions for HTML (or
HTML+TIME for short). HTML+TIME builds on SMIL to support timing for tradi-
tional HTML elements and features much closer integration with the HTML on the
Web page. For example, HTML+TIME lets you write a countdown Web page like
Listing 2-4 that adds to the page as time progresses.

Listing 2-4: A countdown Web page using HTML+TIME

<html>
<head><title>Countdown</title></head>
<body>
<p t:begin=”0” t:dur=”1”>10</p>
<p t:begin=”1” t:dur=”1”>9</p>
<p t:begin=”2” t:dur=”1”>8</p>
<p t:begin=”3” t:dur=”1”>7</p>
<p t:begin=”4” t:dur=”1”>6</p>
<p t:begin=”5” t:dur=”1”>5</p>
<p t:begin=”6” t:dur=”1”>4</p>
<p t:begin=”7” t:dur=”1”>3</p>
<p t:begin=”8” t:dur=”1”>2</p>
<p t:begin=”9” t:dur=”1”>1</p>
<p t:begin=”10” t:dur=”1”>Blast Off!</p>
</body>
</html>

This is useful for slide shows, timed quizzes, and the like. In HTML+TIME, the film
festival example of Listing 2-3 looks like the following:

<t:seq id=”Kubrick”>
<t:audio src=”beethoven9.mid”/>
<t:video src=”corange.mov”/>
<t:textstream src=”clockwork.htm”/>
<t:audio src=”zarathustra.mid”/>
<t:video src=”2001.mov”/>
<t:textstream src=”aclarke.htm”/>
</seq>
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26 Part I ✦ Introducing XML

It’s close to, though not quite exactly the same as, the SMIL version. The major
difference is that the SMIL version is intended to be stored in separate files and
rendered by special players like RealPlayer, whereas the HTML+TIME version is
supposed to be included in the Web page and rendered by the browser. Another
key difference is that there are several products that can play SMIL files now,
including RealPlayer G2, whereas HTML+TIME-enabled Web browsers do not exist
at the moment. However, it’s likely that future versions of Internet Explorer will
include HTML+TIME support.

There are some nice features and some good ideas in HTML+TIME. However, the
W3C had already given its blessing to SMIL several months before Microsoft
proposed HTML+TIME, and SMIL has a lot more momentum and support in the
third-party, content creator community. Thus it seems we’re in for yet another
knockdown, drag-out, Microsoft-vs.-everybody-else-in-the-known-universe battle
which will only leave third party developers bruised and confused. One can only
hope that the W3C has the will and energy to referee this fight fairly. Web
development really would be a lot simpler if Microsoft didn’t pick up its toys and go
home every time they don’t get their way.

Open Software Description

The Open Software Description (OSD) format is an XML application co-developed
by Marimba and Microsoft for updating software automatically. OSD defines XML
tags that describe software components. The description of a component includes
the version of the component, its underlying structure, and its relationships to and
dependencies on other components. This provides enough information for OSD to
decide whether a user needs a particular update or not. If they do need the update,
it can be automatically pushed to users, rather than requiring them to manually
download and install it. Listing 2-5 is an example of an OSD file for an update to
WhizzyWriter 1000:

Listing 2-5: An OSD file for an update to WhizzyWriter 1000

<?XML version=”1.0”?>
<CHANNEL HREF=”http://updates.whizzy.com/updateChannel.html”>
<TITLE>WhizzyWriter 1000 Update Channel</TITLE>
<USAGE VALUE=”SoftwareUpdate”/>
<SOFTPKG HREF=”http://updates.whizzy.com/updateChannel.html”
NAME=”{46181F7D-1C38-22A1-3329-00415C6A4D54}”
VERSION=”5,2,3,1”
STYLE=”MSAppLogo5”
PRECACHE=”yes”>
<TITLE>WhizzyWriter 1000</TITLE>
<ABSTRACT>
Abstract: WhizzyWriter 1000: now with tint control!
</ABSTRACT>
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Chapter 2 ✦ An Introduction to XML Applications 27

<IMPLEMENTATION>
<CODEBASE HREF=”http://updates.whizzy.com/tinupdate.exe”/>
</IMPLEMENTATION>
</SOFTPKG>
</CHANNEL>

Only information about the update is kept in the OSD file. The actual update files
are stored in a separate CAB archive or executable and downloaded when needed.
There is considerable controversy about whether or not this is actually a good
thing. Many software companies, Microsoft not least among them, have a long
history of releasing updates that cause more problems than they fix. Many users
prefer to stay away from new software for a while until other, more adventurous
souls have given it a shakedown.

Scalable Vector Graphics

Vector graphics are superior to the bitmap GIF and JPEG images currently used on
the Web for many pictures including flow charts, cartoons, advertisements, and
similar images. However, many traditional vector graphics formats like PDF,
PostScript, and EPS were designed with ink on paper in mind rather than electrons
on a screen. (This is one reason PDF on the Web is such an inferior replacement for
HTML, despite PDF’s much larger collection of graphics primitives.) A vector
graphics format for the Web should support a lot of features that don’t make sense
on paper like transparency, anti-aliasing, additive color, hypertext, animation, and
hooks to enable search engines and audio renderers to extract text from graphics.
None of these features are needed for the ink-on-paper world of PostScript and PDF.

Several vendors have made a variety of proposals to the W3C for XML applications
for vector graphics. These include:

✦ The Precision Graphics Markup Language (PGML) from IBM, Adobe, Netscape,
and Sun.
✦ The Vector Markup Language (VML) from Microsoft, Macromedia, Autodesk,
Hewlett-Packard, and Visio
✦ Schematic Graphics on the World Wide Web from the Central Laboratory of
the Research Councils
✦ DrawML from Excosoft AB
✦ Hyper Graphics Markup Language (HGML) from PRP and Orange PCSL

Each of these reflects the interests and experience of its authors. For example, not
surprisingly given Adobe’s participation, PGML has the flavor of PostScript but with
XML element-attribute syntax rather than PostScript’s reverse Polish notation.
Listing 2-6 demonstrates the embedding of a pink triangle in PGML.
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28 Part I ✦ Introducing XML

Listing 2-6: A pink triangle in PGML

<?xml version=”1.0”?>
<!DOCTYPE pgml SYSTEM “pgml.dtd”>
<pgml>
<group name=”PinkTriangle” fillcolor=”pink”>
<path>
<moveto x=”0” y=”0”/>
<lineto x=”100” y=”173”/>
<lineto x=”200” y=”0”/>
<closepath/>
</path>
</group>
</pgml>

The W3C has formed a working group with representatives from the above vendors
to decide on a single, unified, scalable vector graphics specification called SVG. SVG
is an XML application for describing two-dimensional graphics. It defines three
basic types of graphics: shapes, images, and text. A shape is defined by its outline,
also known as its path, and may have various strokes or fills. An image is a
bitmapped file like a GIF or a JPEG. Text is defined as a string of text in a particular
font, and may be attached to a path, so it’s not restricted to horizontal lines of text
like the ones that appear on this page. All three kinds of graphics can be positioned
on the page at a particular location, rotated, scaled, skewed, and otherwise
manipulated. Since SVG is a text format, it’s easy for programs to generate
automatically; and it’s easy for programs to manipulate. In particular you can
combine it with DHTML and ECMAScript to make the pictures on a Web page
animated and responsive to user action.

Since SVG describes graphics rather than text — unlike most of the other XML
applications discussed in this chapter — it will probably need special display
software. All of the proposed style-sheet languages assume they’re displaying
fundamentally text-based data, and none of them can support the heavy graphics
requirements of an application like SVG. It’s possible SVG support may be added to
future browsers, especially since Mozilla is open source code; and it would be even
easier for a plug-in to be written. However, for the time being, the prime benefit of
SVG is that it is likely to be used as an exchange format between different programs
like Adobe Illustrator and CorelDraw, which use different native binary formats.

SVG is not fully fleshed out at the time of this writing, and there are exactly zero
implementations of it. The first working draft of SVG was released by the World
Wide Web Consortium in February of 1999. Compared to other working drafts,
however, it is woefully incomplete. It’s really not much more than an outline of
graphics elements that need to be included, without any details about how exactly
those elements will be encoded in XML. I wouldn’t be surprised if this draft got
pushed out the door a little early to head off the adoption of competing efforts
like VML.
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Chapter 2 ✦ An Introduction to XML Applications 29

Vector Markup Language

Microsoft has developed their own XML application for vector graphics called the
Vector Markup Language (VML). VML is more finished than SVG, and is already
supported by Internet Explorer 5.0 and Microsoft Office 2000. Listing 2-7 is an HTML
file with embedded VML that draws the pink triangle. Figure 2-4 shows this file
displayed in Internet Explorer 5.0. However, VML is not nearly as ambitious a
format as SVG, and leaves out a lot of advanced features SVG includes such as
clipping, masking, and compositing.

Listing 2-7: The pink triangle in VML

<html xmlns:vml=”urn:schemas-microsoft-com:vml”>
<head>
<title>
A Pink Triangle, Listing 2-7 from the XML Bible
</title>
<object id=”VMLRender”
classid=”CLSID:10072CEC-8CC1-11D1-986E-00A0C955B42E”>
</object>
<style>
vml\:* { behavior: url(#VMLRender) }
</style>
</head>
<body>

<div>

<vml:polyline
style=”width: 200px; height: 200px”
stroke=”false”
fill=”true”
fillcolor=”#FFCCCC”
points=”10pt, 275pt, 310pt, 275pt, 160pt, 45pt”>
</vml:polyline>

</div>
</body>
</html>

There’s really no reason for there to be two separate, mutually incompatible vector
graphics standards for the Web, and Microsoft will probably grudgingly support
SVG in the end. However, VML is available today, even if its use is limited to
Microsoft products, whereas SVG is only an incomplete draft specification. Web
artists would prefer to have a single standard, but having two is not unheard of
(think Gif and JPEG). As long as the formats are documented and non-proprietary,
3236-7 ch02.F.qc 6/29/99 1:03 PM Page 30

30 Part I ✦ Introducing XML

it’s not out of the question for Web browsers to support both. At the least, the
underlying XML makes it a lot easier for programmers to write converters that
translate files from one format to the other.

Figure 2-4: The pink triangle created with VML

Cross- VML is discussed in more detail in Chapter 22, The Vector Markup Language.
Reference

MusicML
The Connection Factory has created an XML application for sheet music called
MusicML. MusicML includes notes, beats, clefs, staffs, rows, rhythms, rests, beams,
rows, chords and more. Listing 2-8 shows the first bar from Beth Anderson’s Flute
Swale in MusicML.

Listing 2-8: The first bar of Beth Anderson’s Flute Swale

<?xml version=”1.0”?>
<!DOCTYPE sheetmusic SYSTEM “music.dtd”>
<sheetmusic>
<musicrow size=”one”>

<entrysegment>
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Chapter 2 ✦ An Introduction to XML Applications 31

<entrypart cleff=”bass” rythm=”fourquarter”

position=”one”>
<molkruis level=”plus1” name=”f” notetype=”sharp”/>
<molkruis level=”plus1” name=”c” notetype=”sharp”/>
</entrypart>
</entrysegment>

<segment>

<subsegment position=”one”>
<beam size=”double”>
<note beat=”sixteenth” name=”a” level=”zero”
dynamics=”mf”/>
<note beat=”sixteenth” name=”b” level=”zero”></note>
<note beat=”sixteenth” name=”c” level=”plus1”></note>
<note beat=”sixteenth” name=”a” level=”zero”></note>
</beam>
<beam size=”single”>
<note beat=”eighth” name=”d” level=”plus1”/>
<note beat=”eighth” name=”c” level=”plus1”/>
</beam>
<note beat=”quarter” name=”b” level=”zero”/>
<note beat=”quarter” name=”a” level=”zero”/>
</subsegment>

</segment>

</musicrow>
</sheetmusic>

The Connection Factory has also written a Java applet that can parse and display
MusicML. Figure 2-5 shows the above example rendered by this applet. The applet
has a few bugs (for instance the last note is missing) but overall it’s a surprisingly
good rendition.

Figure 2-5: The first bar of Beth

Anderson’s Flute Swale in MusicML

MusicML isn’t going to replace Finale or Nightingale anytime soon. And it really
seems like more of a proof of concept than a polished product. MusicML has a lot
of discrepancies that will drive musicians nuts (e.g., rhythm is misspelled, treble
and bass clefs are reversed, segments should really be measures, and so forth).
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32 Part I ✦ Introducing XML

Nonetheless something like this is a reasonable output format for music notation
programs that enables sheet music to be displayed on the Web. Furthermore, if
the various notation programs all support MusicML or something like it, then it
can be used as an interchange format to move data from one program to the other,
something composers desperately need to be able to do now.

VoxML
Motorola’s VoxML (http://www.voxml.com/) is an XML application for the spoken
word. In particular, it’s intended for those annoying voice mail and automated
phone response systems (“If your hair turned green after using our product, please
press one. If your hair turned purple after using our product, please press two. If
you found an unidentifiable insect in the product, please press 3. Otherwise, please
stay on the line until your hair grows back to its natural color.”).

VoxML enables the same data that’s used on a Web site to be served up via
telephone. It’s particularly useful for information that’s created by combining small
nuggets of data, such as stock prices, sports scores, weather reports, and test
results. The Weather Channel and CBS MarketWatch.com are considering using
VoxML to provide more information over regular voice phones.

A small VoxML file for a shampoo company’s automated phone response system
might look something like the code in Listing 2-9.

Listing 2-9: A VoxML file

<?xml version=”1.0”?>
<DIALOG>
<CLASS NAME=”help_top”>
<HELP>Welcome to TIC consumer products division.
For shampoo information, say shampoo now.
</HELP>
</CLASS>

<STEP NAME=”init” PARENT=”help_top”>

<PROMPT>Welcome to Wonder Shampoo
<BREAK SIZE=”large”/>
Which color did Wonder Shampoo turn your hair?
</PROMPT>
<INPUT TYPE=”OPTIONLIST”>
<OPTION NEXT=”#green”>green</OPTION>
<OPTION NEXT=”#purple”>purple</OPTION>
<OPTION NEXT=”#bald”>bald</OPTION>
<OPTION NEXT=”#bye”>exit</OPTION>
</INPUT>
</STEP>
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Chapter 2 ✦ An Introduction to XML Applications 33

<STEP NAME=”green” PARENT=”help_top”>

<PROMPT>
If Wonder Shampoo turned your hair green and you wish
to return it to its natural color, simply shampoo seven
times with three parts soap, seven parts water, four
parts kerosene, and two parts iguana bile.
</PROMPT>
<INPUT TYPE=”NONE” NEXT=”#bye”/>
</STEP>

<STEP NAME=”purple” PARENT=”help_top”>

<PROMPT>
If Wonder Shampoo turned your hair purple and you wish
to return it to its natural color, please walk
widdershins around your local cemetery
three times while chanting “Surrender Dorothy”.

</PROMPT>
<INPUT TYPE=”NONE” NEXT=”#bye”/>
</STEP>

<STEP NAME=”bald” PARENT=”help_top”>

<PROMPT>
If you went bald as a result of using Wonder Shampoo,
please purchase and apply a three months supply
of our Magic Hair Growth Formula(TM). Please do not
consult an attorney as doing so would violate the
license agreement printed on inside fold of the Wonder
Shampoo box in 3 point type which you agreed to
by opening the package.
</PROMPT>
<INPUT TYPE=”NONE” NEXT=”#bye”/>
</STEP>

<STEP NAME=”bye” PARENT=”help_top”>

<PROMPT>
Thank you for visiting TIC Corp. Goodbye.
</PROMPT>
<INPUT TYPE=”NONE” NEXT=”#exit”/>
</STEP>

</DIALOG>

I can’t show you a screen shot of this example, because it’s not intended to be
shown in a Web browser. Instead, you would listen to it on a telephone.
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34 Part I ✦ Introducing XML

Open Financial Exchange

Software cannot be changed willy-nilly. The data that software knows how to read has
inertia. The more data you have in a given program’s proprietary, undocumented
format, the harder it is to change programs. For example, my personal finances for
the last five years are stored in Quicken. How likely is it that I will change to Microsoft
Money even if Money has features I need that Quicken doesn’t have? Unless Money
can read and convert Quicken files with zero loss of data, the answer is “NOT
BLOODY LIKELY!”

The problem can even occur within a single company or a single company’s
products. Microsoft Word 97 for Windows can’t read documents created by some
earlier versions of Word. And earlier versions of Word can’t read Word 97 files at all.
And Microsoft Word 98 for the Mac can’t quite read everything that’s in a Word 97
for Windows file, even though Word 98 for the Mac came out a year later!

As noted in Chapter 1, the Open Financial Exchange Format (OFX) is an XML

application used to describe financial data of the type you’re likely to store in a
personal finance product like Money or Quicken. Any program that understands
OFX can read OFX data. And since OFX is fully documented and non-proprietary
(unlike the binary formats of Money, Quicken, and other programs) it’s easy for
programmers to write the code to understand OFX.

OFX not only allows Money and Quicken to exchange data with each other. It allows
other programs that use the same format to exchange the data as well. For
instance, if a bank wants to deliver statements to customers electronically, it only
has to write one program to encode the statements in the OFX format rather than
several programs to encode the statement in Quicken’s format, Money’s format,
Managing Your Money’s format, and so forth.

The more programs that use a given format, the greater the savings in development
cost and effort. For example, six programs reading and writing their own and each
other’s proprietary format require 36 different converters. Six programs reading
and writing the same OFX format require only six converters. Effort is reduced to
O(n) rather than O(n2). Figure 2-6 depicts six programs reading and writing their
own and each other’s proprietary format. Figure 2-7 depicts six programs reading
and writing the same OFX format. Every arrow represents a converter that has to
trade files and data between programs. In Figure 2-6, you can see the connections
for six different programs reading and writing each other’s proprietary binary
format. In Figure 2-7, you can see the same six different programs reading and
writing one open XML format. The XML-based exchange is much simpler and
cleaner than the binary-format exchange.
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Chapter 2 ✦ An Introduction to XML Applications 35

Quicken Money

CheckFree

Mutual Fund
Program

Managing Your Money Proprietary

Bank System

Figure 2-6: Six different programs reading and writing their own and each other’s formats
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36 Part I ✦ Introducing XML

Quicken Money

CheckFree

OFX
Format
Mutual Fund
Program

Managing Your Money Proprietary

Bank System

Figure 2-7: Six programs reading and writing the same OFX format

Extensible Forms Description Language

I went down to my local bookstore today and bought a copy of Armistead Maupin’s
novel Sure of You. I paid for that purchase with a credit card, and when I did so I
signed a piece of paper agreeing to pay the credit card company $14.07 when billed.
Eventually they will send me a bill for that purchase, and I’ll pay it. If I refuse to pay
it, then the credit card company can take me to court to collect, and they can use
my signature on that piece of paper to prove to the court that on October 15, 1998 I
really did agree to pay them $14.07.

The same day I also ordered Anne Rice’s The Vampire Armand from the online
bookstore amazon.com. Amazon charged me $16.17 plus $3.95 shipping and
handling and again I paid for that purchase with a credit card. But the difference is
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Chapter 2 ✦ An Introduction to XML Applications 37

that Amazon never got a signature on a piece of paper from me. Eventually the
credit card company will send me a bill for that purchase, and I’ll pay it. But if I did
refuse to pay the bill, they don’t have a piece of paper with my signature on it
showing that I agreed to pay $20.12 on October 15, 1998. If I claim that I never made
the purchase, the credit card company will bill the charges back to Amazon. Before
Amazon or any other online or phone-order merchant is allowed to accept credit
card purchases without a signature in ink on paper, they have to agree that they will
take responsibility for all disputed transactions.

Exact numbers are hard to come by, and of course vary from merchant to
merchant, but probably a little under 10% of Internet transactions get billed back to
the originating merchant because of credit card fraud or disputes. This is a huge
amount! Consumer businesses like Amazon simply accept this as a cost of doing
business on the Net and work it into their price structure, but obviously this isn’t
going to work for six figure business-to-business transactions. Nobody wants to
send out $200,000 of masonry supplies only to have the purchaser claim they never
made or received the order. Before business-to-business transactions can move
onto the Internet, a method needs to be developed that can verify that an order was
in fact made by a particular person and that this person is who he or she claims to
be. Furthermore, this has to be enforceable in court. (It’s a sad fact of American
business that many companies won’t do business with anyone they can’t sue.)

Part of the solution to the problem is digital signatures — the electronic equivalent
of ink on paper. To digitally sign a document, you calculate a hash code for the
document using a known algorithm, encrypt the hash code with your private key,
and attach the encrypted hash code to the document. Correspondents can decrypt
the hash code using your public key and verify that it matches the document.
However, they can’t sign documents on your behalf because they don’t have your
private key. The exact protocol followed is a little more complex in practice, but the
bottom line is that your private key is merged with the data you’re signing in a
verifiable fashion. No one who doesn’t know your private key can sign the
document.

The scheme isn’t foolproof — it’s vulnerable to your private key being stolen, for
example-but it’s probably as hard to forge a digital signature as it is to forge a real
ink-on-paper signature. However, there are also a number of less obvious attacks on
digital signature protocols. One of the most important is changing the data that’s
signed. Changing the data that’s signed should invalidate the signature, but it
doesn’t if the changed data wasn’t included in the first place. For example, when
you submit an HTML form, the only things sent are the values that you fill into the
form’s fields and the names of the fields. The rest of the HTML markup is not
included. You may agree to pay $1500 for a new 450 MHz Pentium II PC running
Windows NT, but the only thing sent on the form is the $1500. Signing this number
signifies what you’re paying, but not what you’re paying for. The merchant can then
send you two gross of flushometers and claim that’s what you bought for your
$1500. Obviously, if digital signatures are to be useful, all details of the transaction
must be included. Nothing can be omitted.
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38 Part I ✦ Introducing XML

The problem gets worse if you have to deal with the U.S. federal government.
Government regulations for purchase orders and requisitions often spell out the
contents of forms in minute detail, right down to the font face and type size. Failure
to adhere to the exact specifications can lead to your invoice for $20,000,000 worth
of depleted uranium artillery shells being rejected. Therefore, you not only need to
establish exactly what was agreed to; you also need to establish that you met all
legal requirements for the form. HTML’s forms just aren’t sophisticated enough to
handle these needs.

XML, however, can. It is almost always possible to use XML to develop a markup
language with the right combination of power and rigor to meet your needs, and
this example is no exception. In particular UWI.COM has proposed an XML
application called the Extensible Forms Description Language (XFDL) for forms
with extremely tight legal requirements that are to be signed with digital signatures.
XFDL further offers the option to do simple mathematics in the form, for instance to
automatically fill in the sales tax and shipping and handling charges and total up
the price.

UWI.COM has submitted XFDL to the W3C, but it’s really overkill for Web brow-
sers, and thus probably won’t be adopted there. The real benefit of XFDL, if it
becomes widely adopted, is in business-to-business and business-to-government
transactions. XFDL can become a key part of electronic commerce, which is not
to say it will become a key part of electronic commerce. It’s still early, and there
are other players in this space.

Human Resources Markup Language

HireScape’s Human Resources Markup Language (HRML) is an XML application that
provides a simple vocabulary for describing job openings. It defines elements
matching the parts of a typical classified want ad such as companies, divisions,
recruiters, contact information, terms, experience, and more. A job listing in HRML
might look something like the code in Listing 2-10.

Listing 2-10: A Job Listing in HRML

<?xml version=”1.0”?>
<HRML_JOB>

<COMPANY>

<CO_NAME>IDG Books</CO_NAME>
<CO_INTERNET_ADDR>
<CO_HOME_PAGE>http://www.idgbooks.com/</CO_HOME_PAGE>
<CO_JOBS_PAGE>
http://www.idgbooks.com/cgi-
bin/gatekeeper.pl?uidg4841:%2Fcompany%2Fjobs%2Findex.html
</CO_JOBS_PAGE>
</CO_INTERNET_ADDR>
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Chapter 2 ✦ An Introduction to XML Applications 39

</COMPANY>

<JOB>

<JOB_METADATA>
<JOB_LOADED_DT>09/10/1998</JOB_LOADED_DT>
<JOB_LOADED_URL>
http://www.idgbooks.com/cgi-
bin/gatekeeper.pl?uidg4841:%2Fcompany%2Fjobs%2Findex.html
</JOB_LOADED_URL>
</JOB_METADATA>

<JOB_DATA>

<JOB_TITLE>Web Development Manager</JOB_TITLE>

<JOB_NUMBER_AVAIL>1</JOB_NUMBER_AVAIL>
<JOB_YEARS_EXP>3</JOB_YEARS_EXP>
<JOB_DESC>
This position is responsible for the technical
and production functions of the Online
group as well as strategizing and implementing
technology to improve the IDG Books web sites.
Skills must include Perl, C/C++, HTML, SQL, JavaScript,
Windows NT 4, mod-perl, CGI, TCP/IP, Netscape servers
and Apache server. You must also have excellent
communication skills, project management, the ability
to communicate technical solutions to non-technical
people and management experience.
</JOB_DESC>

<JOB_KEYWORDS>
Perl, C/C++, HTML, SQL, JavaScript, Windows NT 4,
mod-perl, CGI, TCP/IP, Netscape server, Apache server
</JOB_KEYWORDS>

<JOB_TERMS PAY=”Salaried” TYPE=”Full-time”>

$60,000
</JOB_TERMS>

<JOB_LOCATION CITY=”Foster City” STATE=”California”

STATE_ABBR=”CA” POSTAL_CODE=”94404” COUNTRY=”USA”>
</JOB_LOCATION>

</JOB_DATA>

</JOB>

<RESPONSE>

<RESP_EMAIL>[email protected]</RESP_EMAIL>
<POSTAL_ADDR ENTITY_TYPE=”Response”>

Continued
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40 Part I ✦ Introducing XML

Listing 2-10 (continued)

<ADDR_LINE_1>Dee Harris, HR Manager</ADDR_LINE_1>
<ADDR_LINE_2>919 E. Hillsdale Blvd.</ADDR_LINE_2>
<ADDR_LINE_3>Suite 400</ADDR_LINE_3>
<CITY>Foster City</CITY>
<STATE>CA</STATE>
<POSTAL_CODE>94404</POSTAL_CODE>
</POSTAL_ADDR>

</RESPONSE>

</HRML_JOB>

Although you could certainly define a style sheet for HRML, and use it to place job
listings on Web pages, that’s not its main purpose. Instead HRML is designed to
automate the exchange of job information between companies, applicants,
recruiters, job boards, and other interested parties. There are hundreds of job
boards on the Internet today as well as numerous Usenet newsgroups and mailing
lists. It’s impossible for one individual to search them all, and it’s hard for a
computer to search them all because they all use different formats for salaries,
locations, benefits, and the like.

But if many sites adopt HRML, then it becomes relatively easy for a job seeker to
search with criteria like “all the jobs for Java programmers in New York City paying
more than $100,000 a year with full health benefits.” The IRS could enter a search
for all full-time, on-site, freelance openings so they’d know which companies to go
after for failure to withhold tax and pay unemployment insurance.

In practice, these searches would likely be mediated through an HTML form just
like current Web searches. The main difference is that such a search would return
far more useful results because it can use the structure in the data and semantics of
the markup rather than relying on imprecise English text.

Resource Description Framework

XML adds structure to documents. The Resource Description Framework (RDF)
is an XML application that adds semantics. RDF can be used to specify anything
from the author and abstract of a Web page to the version and dependencies of a
software package to the director, screenwriter, and actors in a movie. What links
all of these uses is that what’s being encoded in RDF is not the data itself (the Web
page, the software, the movie) but information about the data. This data about data
is called meta-data, and is RDF’s raison d’être.
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Chapter 2 ✦ An Introduction to XML Applications 41

An RDF vocabulary defines a set of elements and their permitted content that’s
appropriate for meta-data in a given domain. RDF enables communities of interest to
standardize their vocabularies and share those vocabularies with others who may
extend them. For example, the Dublin Core is an RDF vocabulary specifically designed
for meta-data about Web pages. Educom’s Instructional Metadata System (IMS) builds
on the Dublin Core by adding additional elements that are useful when describing
school-related content like learning level, educational objectives, and price.

Of course, although RDF can be used for print-publishing systems, video-store

catalogs, automated software updates, and much more, it’s likely to be adopted
first for embedding meta-data in Web pages. RDF has the potential to synchronize
the current hodge-podge of <META> tags used for site maps, content rating,
automated indexing, and digital libraries into a unified collection that all of these
tools understand. Once RDF meta-data becomes a standard part of Web pages,
search engines will be able to return more focused, useful results. Intelligent
agents can more easily traverse the Web to find information you want or conduct
business for you. The Web can go from its current state as an unordered sea of
information to a structured, searchable, understandable store of data.

As the name implies, RDF describes resources. A resource is anything that can be
addressed with a URI. The description of a resource is composed of a number of
properties. Each property has a type and a value. For example, <DC:Format>HTML
</DC:Format> has the type “DC:Format” and the value “HTML”. Values may be text
strings, numbers, dates, and so forth, or they may be other resources. These other
resources can have their own descriptions in RDF. For example, the code in Listing
2-11 uses the Dublin Core vocabulary to describe the Cafe con Leche Web site.

Listing 2-11: An RDF description of the Cafe con Leche home

page using the Dublin Core vocabulary
<RDF:RDF
xmlns:RDF=”http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#”
xmlns:DC=”http://purl.org/DC/”>

<RDF:Description about=”http://metalab.unc.edu/xml/”>
<DC:Creator>Elliotte Rusty Harold</DC:Creator>
<DC:Language>en</DC:Language>
<DC:Format>HTML</DC:Format>
<DC:Date>1999-08-19</DC:date>
<DC:Type>home page</DC:Type>
<DC:Title>Cafe con Leche</DC:Title>
</RDF:Description>

</RDF:RDF>
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42 Part I ✦ Introducing XML

RDF will be used for version 2.0 of the Platform for Internet Content Selection (PICS)
and the Platform for Privacy Preferences (P3P) as well as for many other areas
where meta-data is needed to describe Web pages and other kinds of content.

XML for XML

XML is an extremely general-purpose format for text data. Some of the things it is
used for are further refinements of XML itself. These include the XSL style-sheet
language, the XLL-linking language, and the Document Content Description for XML.

XSL
XSL, the Extensible Style Language, is itself an XML application. XSL has two major
parts. The first part defines a vocabulary for transforming XML documents. This
part of XSL includes XML tags for trees, nodes, patterns, templates, and other
elements needed for matching and transforming XML documents from one markup
vocabulary to another (or even to the same one in a different order).

The second part of XSL defines an XML vocabulary for formatting the transformed
XML document produced by the first part. This includes XML tags for formatting
objects including pagination, blocks, characters, lists, graphics, boxes, fonts, and
more. A typical XSL style sheet is shown in Listing 2-12:

Listing 2-12: An XSL style sheet

<?xml version=”1.0”?>
<xsl:stylesheet
xmlns:xsl=”http://www.w3.org/TR/WD-xsl”
xmlns:fo=”http://www.w3.org/TR/WD-xsl/FO”
result-ns=”fo”>
<xsl:template match=”/”>
<fo:basic-page-sequence >
<xsl:apply-templates/>
</fo:basic-page-sequence>
</xsl:template>

<xsl:template match=”ATOM”>
<fo:block font-size=”10pt” font-family=”serif”
space-before=”12pt”>
<xsl:value-of select=”NAME”/>
</fo:block>
</xsl:template>

</xsl:stylesheet>
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Chapter 2 ✦ An Introduction to XML Applications 43

We’ll explore XSL in great detail in Chapters 14 and 15.

XLL
The Extensible Linking Language, XLL, defines a new, more general kind of link
called an XLink. XLinks accomplish everything possible with HTML’s URL-based
hyperlinks and anchors. However, any element can become a link, not just A
elements. For instance a footnote element can link directly to the text of the note
like this:

<footnote xlink:form=”simple” href=”footnote7.xml”>7</footnote>

Furthermore, XLinks can do a lot of things HTML links can’t. XLinks can be bi-
directional so readers can return to the page they came from. XLinks can link to
arbitrary positions in a document. XLinks can embed text or graphic data inside a
document rather than requiring the user to activate the link (much like HTML’s
<IMG> tag but more flexible). In short, XLinks make hypertext even more powerful.

Cross- XLinks are discussed in more detail in Chapter 16, XLinks.

Reference

DCD
XML’s facilities for declaring how the contents of an XML element should be
formatted are weak to nonexistent. For example, suppose as part of a date, you set
up MONTH elements like this:

<MONTH>9</MONTH>

All you can say is that the contents of the MONTH element should be character data.
You cannot say that the month should be given as an integer between 1 and 12.

A number of schemes have been proposed to use XML itself to more tightly restrict
what can appear in the contents of any given element. One such proposal is the
Document Content Description, (DCD). For example, here’s a DCD that declares that
MONTH elements may only contain an integer between 1 and 12:

<DCD>
<ElementDef Type=”MONTH” Model=”Data” Datatype=”i1”
Min=”1” Max=”12” />
</DCD>

There are more examples I could show you of XML used for XML, but the ones I’ve
already discussed demonstrate the basic point: XML is powerful enough to
describe and extend itself. Among other things, this means that the XML
specification can remain small and simple. There may well never be an XML 2.0
because any major additions that are needed can be built out of raw XML rather
3236-7 ch02.F.qc 6/29/99 1:03 PM Page 44

44 Part I ✦ Introducing XML

than becoming new features of the XML. People and programs that need these
enhanced features can use them. Others who don’t need them can ignore them. You
don’t need to know about what you don’t use. XML provides the bricks and mortar
from which you can build simple huts or towering castles.

Behind-the-Scene Uses of XML

Not all XML applications are public, open standards. A lot of software vendors are
moving to XML for their own data simply because it’s a well-understood, general-
purpose format for structured data that can be manipulated with easily available
cheap and free tools.

Microsoft Office 2000 promotes HTML to a coequal file format with its native binary
formats. However, HTML 4.0 doesn’t provide support for all of the features Office
requires, such as revision tracking, footnotes, comments, index and glossary
entries, and more. Additional data that can’t be written as HTML is embedded in
the file in small chunks of XML. Word’s vector graphics will be stored in VML. In this
case, embedded XML’s invisibility in standard browsers is the crucial factor.

Federal Express uses detailed tracking information as a competitive advantage over

other shippers like UPS and the Post Office. First that information was available
through custom software, then through the Web. More recently FedEx has begun
beta testing an API/library that third-party and in-house developers can use to
integrate their software and systems with FedEx’s. The data format used for this
service is XML.

Netscape Navigator 5.0 supports direct display of XML in the Web browser, but
Netscape actually started using XML internally as early as version 4.5. When you
ask Netscape to show you a list of sites related to the current one you’re looking it,
your browser connects to a CGI program running on a Netscape server. The data
that server sends back is XML. Listing 2-13 shows the XML data for sites related to
http://metalab.unc.edu/.

Listing 2-13: XML data for sites related to

http://metalab.unc.edu/
<?xml version=”1.0”?>
<RDF:RDF>
<RelatedLinks>
<aboutPage
href=”http://info.netscape.com/fwd/rl/http://metalab.unc.edu:80
/*”>
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Chapter 2 ✦ An Introduction to XML Applications 45

</aboutPage>
<child instanceOf=”Separator1”></child>
<child
href=”http://info.netscape.com/fwd/rl/http://www.sun.com/”
name=”Sun Microsystems”>
</child>
<child
href=”http://info.netscape.com/fwd/rl/http://www.unc.edu/”
name=”Unc”>
</child>
<child
href=”http://info.netscape.com/fwd/rl/http://sunsite.sut.ac.jp/
” name=”SunSITE Japan”>
</child>
<child
href=”http://info.netscape.com/fwd/rl/http://sunsite.nus.sg/”
name=”SunSITE Singapore”>
</child>
<child
href=”http://info.netscape.com/fwd/rl/http://sunsite.berkeley.e
du/” name=”Berkeley Digital Library SunSITE”>
</child>
<child
href=”http://info.netscape.com/fwd/rl/http://www.sun.com/sunsit
e” name=”SunSITE on the net”>
</child>
<child
href=”http://info.netscape.com/fwd/rl/http://www.sunsite.auc.dk
/” name=”SunSITE Denmark”>
</child>
<child
href=”http://info.netscape.com/fwd/rl/http://sunsite.edu.cn/”
name=”SunSITE China”>
</child>
<child
href=”http://info.netscape.com/fwd/rl/http://sunsite.stanford.o
rg/” name=”Stanford University SunSITE”>
</child>
<child
href=”http://info.netscape.com/fwd/rl/http://www.cdromshop.com/
cdshop/desc/p.061590000085.html” name=”SunSITE Archive”>
</child>
<child instanceOf=”Separator1”></child>
<child instanceOf=”Separator1”></child>
<child href=”http://home.netscape.com/escapes/smart_browsing”
name=”Learn About Smart Browsing...”>
</child>
</RelatedLinks>
</RDF:RDF>
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46 Part I ✦ Introducing XML

This all happens completely behind the scenes. The users never know that the data
is being transferred in XML. The actual display is a menu in Netscape Navigator, not
an XML or HTML page.

This really just scratches the surface of the use of XML for internal data. Many
other projects that use XML are just getting started, and many more will be started
over the next year. Most of these won’t receive any publicity or write-ups in the
trade press, but they nonetheless have the potential to save their companies
thousands of dollars in development costs over the life of the project. The self-
documenting nature of XML can be as useful for a company’s internal data as for its
external data. For instance, many companies right now are scrambling to try and
figure out whether programmers who retired 20 years ago used two-digit dates. If
that were your job, would you rather be pouring over data that looked like this:

3c 79 65 61 72 3e 39 39 3c 2f 79 65 61 72 3e

or like this:

<YEAR>99</YEAR>

Unfortunately many programmers are now stuck trying to clean up data in the first
format. XML even makes the mistakes easier to find and fix.

Summary
This chapter has just begun to touch the many and varied applications to which
XML has been and will be put. Some of these applications like CML, MathML, and
MusicML are clear extensions to HTML for Web browsers. But many others, like
OFX, XFDL, and HRML, go into completely new directions. And all of these
applications have their own semantics and syntax that sits on top of the underlying
XML. In some cases, the XML roots are obvious. In other cases, you could easily
spend months working with it and only hear of XML tangentially. In this chapter,
you explored the following applications to which XML has been put to use:

✦ Molecular sciences with CML

✦ Science and math with MathML
✦ Webcasting with CDF
✦ Classic literature
✦ Multimedia with SMIL and HTML+TIME
✦ Software updates through OSD
✦ Vector graphics with both PGML and VML
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Chapter 2 ✦ An Introduction to XML Applications 47

✦ Music notation in MusicML

✦ Automated voice responses with VoxML
✦ Financial data with OFX
✦ Legally binding forms with XFDL
✦ Human resources job information with HRML
✦ Meta-data through RDF
✦ XML itself, including XSL, XLL, and DCD, to refine XML
✦ Internal use of XML by various companies, including Microsoft, Federal
Express, and Netscape
In the next chapter, you will begin writing your own XML documents and displaying
them in Web browsers.

✦ ✦ ✦
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