Exercise 11: XML introduction

1. Conduct research on the Internet to find out what tools can be used to parse an XML document and ensure that the document is well formed and valid.

Parser is a essential tool for reading and modifying XML document. The term 'parser' are sometimes interchangeable with 'processor'. Any program that input an XML file and produces the output based on the XML files content is an XML processor. An XML browser is a kind of processor. A parser is software that performs the first step in the processing of an XML document. Parser is almost always used as part of an XML processor. The foundation task of a parser is checking the XML document for well-formed data, and make sure the documents content follows the rules of XML syntax. Most of the parsers can check the document for validity by checking against Document Type Definition (DTD) or Schema. The final task of the parser may perform to make the content of the document, both markup and data, available to the processing software. SAX (Simple API for XML) API or Document Object Model (DOM) API does this (Dev Shed, N.A.).

2. What are the benefits of adopting a schema standardized for a business sector?

A schema standardized like XML, can be used as information exchange for different formats in different computer systems and databases. Developers do that challenging and time wasting job in data exchange between such system over Internet. It is simple in converting data to XML and generate data that can be read by different types of applications. XML data can be store in files or database. So applications can store and retrieve information from the data store, then display the data out.

3. SMIL is an application of XML. What is the purpose of this technology? Where does it apply?

SMIL is stand for Synchronized Multimedia Integration Language. SMIL define an XML-based language that allows authors to write interactive multimedia presentations. In SMIL, authors may describe the temporal behaviour of a multimedia presentation, associate hyperlinks with media objects and describe the layout of the presentation on a screen(Bulterman, 2008).

SMIL enables simple authoring of interactive audio and visual presentations. SMIL integrates streaming audio and video with images, text or any other media type in "rich media" multimedia presentations. SMIL presentations can be written by using of a simple text-editor. The SMIL language is easy to learn (W3C, 2008).

Reference

1. Dev Shed (N.A.), My first xml document - tools for parsing xml, Developer Shed., 5-6. Retrieved from http://www.devshed.com/c/a/XML/My-First-XML-Document/2/ on 20th March, 2009
2. Bulterman, B. and W3C's partners (2008)., Synchronized multimedia integration language (smil 3.0), W3C. Retreved from http://www.w3.org/TR/2008/REC-SMIL3-20081201/ on 20th March, 2009.
   
3. W3C (2008)., Synchronized Multimedia, W3C. Retrieved from http://www.w3.org/AudioVideo/ on 20th March, 2009.