XM201
XM201: XML for Developers (2 days)
Course Overview
This workshop presents an overview of XML (the World-Wide Web Consortium's eXtensible Markup Language). XML is viewed as a key technology that is pushing the Internet 'forward' and enhancing its capacity to support e-commerce and foster a viable on-line marketplace. XML is not just about the Internet however, it has many applications in the wider business arena and is being touted as the standard infrastructure underlying next-generation middleware systems based on Web Services.
XML is also strongly supported by organizations such as IBM, Oracle, Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft, Macromedia and Adobe and is finding its way into many of these organisations products and enterprise solutions. For example, Microsoft has incorporated support for XML into Internet Explorer, its Office product suites and throughout its .NET infrastructure and server offerings. Various J2EE products and standards extensively overlap with the XML world. Content Management systems also typically offer varying degrees of XML support.
Course Objectives
Participants will:
Examine the concepts behind XML
Look at the standardization activity occurring in the XML community
Learn how to apply XML with particular reference to deploying XML on the World-Wide Web
Examine a number of XML-related technologies
Gain an understanding of how XML can be used to resolve many common data-exchange problems
Through various exercises, they will also gain a hands-on working knowledge of XML as supported by various XML parsers, XML tools and browsers such as Microsoft Internet Explorer 5/6 and Netscape/Mozilla/Firefox.
Audience
This workshop is suitable for programmers working on Internet or Intranet applications, other developers who need to know how XML will affect their work and people interested in the exchange of data between disparate systems. All modules have a strong practical component, which enables each participant to learn from hands-on experience and from others while working alone or in small teams. Participants will also receive a full copy of supporting notes, designed to complement the instruction and workshops.
Pre-requisites
Participants should have some prior knowledge of programming and the older, but more widespread, HTML technology.
Course Topics
Introducing XML: The need for portable data
XML Structure and Syntax: Elements, Attributes, Namespaces, Entities
XML in Context: Data Representation, Searching, Integration, Messaging
Description Techniques for XML: DTDs, Schemas
XML and Data: InfoSets, Data Types, XQuery, Database Integration
Rendering and Formatting XML: CSS2, XSLT, XSLFO
XML Browser Support: IE, Netscape/Mozilla, Opera
XML Linking Technologies: XLink, XPath, XPointer, XInclude, XBase
Parsing and Transforming XML: DOM, SAX, XSLT
XML Gallery: SMIL, SVG/VML, MathML, WML, XHTML, XForms, CML, VoiceXML
XML and Language Integration: JavaScript, Java, J2EE, .NET
XML and Web Services: SOAP, UDDI, WSDL
XML and B2B Integration: BPEL4WS, RosettaNet, BizTalk, ebXML, OAGI
XML and Content Management: RDF, PRISM, Dublic Core, XMP, ICE, RSS, WebDAV
XML Futures: Standards Activities, Trends