Advanced HTML

BCS 500

Seneca College, Newnham Campus, Toronto, Canada

Section A

Section B

Section Sound

Section Java

Section MKT

Section XML

Detailed Course Outline
SECTION XML

www.witiger.com/senecacollege/BCS500/BCS500classlist2001.htm

this page last updated 2001 April 4

Since this section was taught in April 2000, it has to be extensively re-done before teaching it in April 2001.
Some of the links are broken and new information is being added in.

Guest Lecturer
Pam Hardin
Tech Support Team Leader
Softquad Software, Ltd.
will come to Seneca's
BCS 500 class to talk about
XML basics - April 9th
XMetal 2.0 - April 11th

XML does have a commercial editor called by its brand name XMetal 2.0
In this section of the course, we will have special guest speakers from Softquad, the makers of XMetal.
Softquad is the world's leading developer of XML software and has some of the globe's key experts on XML working with their company.
XMetal FAQ
http://www.softquad.com/top_frame.sq?page=products
/xmetal/content_xmtl_faq.html

How XML works
An example of a difference between line of code in an HTML file and a XML file

HTML XML

<body>
Jane Doe
</body> <body>
<name>
    <first>
       Jane
    </first>
    </last>
       Doe
    </last>
</name>
</body>

another example of the HTML / XML difference by Bert Bos
http://www.w3.org/XML/simple-XML.html

What is XML

What is XML

Chpt 14
Future
Developments
XML

What is XML

What is XML

Q - Aren’t XML, SGML, and HTML all the same thing?
A - no. not quite
http://www.ucc.ie/xml/#FAQ-SAME
THE OFFICIAL XML FAQ
http://www.ucc.ie/xml/
Maintained on behalf of the World Wide Web Consortium’s XML Special Interest Group by Peter Flynn, (University College Cork)

from Rick Darnell's book HTML Unleashed
Chapter 38 - The Emergence of eXtensible Markup Language
http://www.webreference.com/dlab/books/html/38-0.html
- you can read most of this chapter on-line at the publisher's web site
- the premises of XML
"In a sense, XML is positioned somewhere in between SGML and HTML, with the intent of its creators being to combine the best features of these two languages. However, XML is much closer to SGML than to HTML, and although knowledge of HTML will help you understand the most obvious XML features, an acquaintance with SGML syntax and ideology would be of much better help. "
- well formed XML documents
- linking capabilities of XML

- The SGML/XML Master Web Page by Robin Clover the main page of links

How is XML used? - by Martin Bryan of The SGML Centre
http://www.personal.u-net.com/~sgml/xmlintro.htm
Because XML tag sets are based on the logical structure of the document they are somewhat easier to understand, and
remember, than physically based markup schemes of the type typically provided by word processors. An XML memo might be
coded as:
<memo>
<to>All staff</to>
<from>Martin Bryan</from>
<date>5th November</date>
<subject>Cats and Dogs</subject>
<text>Please remember to keep all cats and dogs indoors tonight.</text>
</memo>

A look at XML, by Adam Rifkin
http://www.webdeveloper.com/xml/xml_a_look_at_xml.html
on the
site
"XML is not a replacement for HTML, either: HTML is a useful tool for
storing and exchanging small hypermedia documents across the Internet.
Furthermore, it is easy to generate HTML documents on the fly from XML
(or SGML) documents. XML is designed to complement HTML by enabling
different kinds of data to be exchanged over the Web."

This diagram explains how XML is a
family of tools.
Original diagram is from the W3C site at
http://www.w3.org/XML
/Activity.html

Home Pages of SGML/XML Experts
(by Robin Cover)
http://www.oasis-open.org/cover/homepages.html

How XML works

How XML works

How XML works

How XML works

How XML works

How XML works

Natanya Pitts wrote a book titled XML In Record Time which the professor of this course has used. This book is published by Sybex group.

Sybex Main Page for the book

There is a web site for XML In Record Time which has many helpful links because much of what is in the book you buy, is also available on their web site for free. http://www.sybex.com/cgi-bin/rd_
link_temp.pl?2340link.html

XML presentation by Ryan McRonald of York University

One of Ryan McRonald's slides explaining XML

Another XML Powerpoint presentation by R M on
XML Syntax
http://dept.econ.
yorku.ca
/~ryanm/xml-syntax2
/sld001.htm
This particular slide
http://dept.econ.
yorku.ca
/~ryanm/xml-
syntax2/sld029.htm
explains the importance of a DTD which "sets up" the elements

http://dept.econ.yorku.ca/~ryanm/xml-syntax2/sld030.htm After you do the DTD, you then need to do the page with the Elements

.

XML
and
E-commerce XML and E-commerce
(XML augmenting EDI)
www.zdnet.com/ecommerce/stories/main/0,10475,2610043,00.html

"For some very good reasons, XML has quickly gained a reputation as the lingua franca of B2B e-commerce. Based on Internet protocols such as HTTP, XML is much easier and less expensive to deploy on the Web than EDI, making it a natural for smaller businesses without the IS staffs or money to deploy EDI. In fact, by next year, 70 percent of all B2B transactions executed on the Web will be done using XML, Gartner Group Inc. predicts. The bulk of those transactions will involve small and midsize enterprises that today do not use EDI."

.

XML
and
E-commerce

XML
and
E-commerce

XML
and
E-commerce
XML and E-commerce

Why is XML being touted so highly as a critical contribution to e-commerce

Read the text of a Chicago Tribune article (Aug 1999) that discusses XML re: E-commerce. While HTML simply describes the format of a document, XML allows documents to be treated as data.
While HTML's tags are defined by standards bodies and deal primarily with formatting, users of XML can create tags to identify whatever they wish.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/xml/scenario/intro.asp? This section of the Microsoft XML site describes how industry leaders are using XML-based applications today to increase sales and productivity, improve customer satisfaction, and lower costs.

Case Study
Building an Integrated Maintenance and Ordering System Using XML

http://msdn.microsoft.com/xml/scenario/enigma.asp
-Case Study Summary:
An airline currently suffers from excessive equipment down time and high maintenance costs caused by manual and non-integrated information processes. Service engineers have to separately search and manually integrate data from flat files, relational databases, and remote supplier parts catalogs. This is cumbersome and time-consuming because first they have to identify the problem using data from various sources

example of what the XML code would look like in the Case Study above
http://msdn.microsoft.com/xml/scenario/enigma.asp#example
XML Example: Parts Information
<PART>
    <PARTLIST>
     <PART-NUM>12983</PART-NUM>
     <PART-NAME>SEAT SUPPORT</PART-NAME>
     <UNITS-PER-ASSEMBLY>1</UNITS-PER-ASSEMBLY>
    </PARTLIST>
    <INSTALL-INFO>
       <SUPPLIER-NOTE>The installation of the seat support should be performed
       only after the entire seat unit is removed from the floor base.
       </SUPPLIER-NOTE>
       <AIRLINE-CAUTION> Airline X has personal TV's in every seat back, so
       be sure to disconnect the TV wiring prior to removing
      the broken support.
       </AIRLINE-CAUTION>
    </INSTALL-INFO>
</PART>

http://msdn.microsoft.com/xml/scenario/intro.asp?
"Improving the Online Shopping Experience with XML"
from
http://msdn.microsoft.com/xml/scenario/junglee.asp
"Today, a Web shopper who desires to purchase a particular product is faced with many challenges. He must know the names of appropriate online merchant Web sites, enter each individually, know how to conduct his search, compile the results, and then somehow compare all of the results to determine where to make the purchase. Every Web site has a separate structure and vocabulary, making it difficult to quickly evaluate the search results. Due to the limitations of HTML, the shopper's search may produce too much or too little information or even completely different results from different merchant sites. All of these factors can make today's Web shopping experience frustrating and inefficient. Thus, a shopping guide that allows online shoppers to search and compare across multiple merchants is required. "

This diagram, from
http://msdn.
microsoft
.com/xml/
scenario/junglee
.asp#diagram
helps to explain the role that XML will have in E-commerce

XML
and
E-commerce

XML and E-commerce Security

story appeared in Yahoonews, in November 2000, which originated from CNET
Microsoft, VeriSign and WebMethods said [November 29th, 2000] they have developed technology designed to make it easier to use digital signatures and other online security tools with e-commerce applications.

The story, written by Melanie Austria Farmer, decribes how "... the technology is intended to help programmers easily add digital signatures and data encryption to their e-commerce applications."
Microsoft, VeriSign and WebMethods have developed something they call XKMS
XKMS = Extensible Markup Language key management specification
Farmer notes that ".. by having a standard such as XKMS in place, companies will have the potential to speed the process of finalizing an online contract or completing a transaction by being able to accept a legitimate signature electronically, as opposed to sending a fax with a handwritten one."
On the Webmethods.com website there is a press release that further describes the situation.
www.webMethods.com/press_release_detail/0,1075,927,00.html
XKMS (XML Key Management Specification as described on the Verisign website
www.verisign.com/developer/xml/xkms.html
The specification for XKMS and a white paper are available also at
www.verisign.com/developer/xml/xkms.html