On Tuesday, July 8, 2003, 1:26:43 PM, Petre wrote: [ snip ]
PA> Now on M$ systems, it seems that IIS has built in ActiveX XMLDOM parsing PA> built in, and you can "easily" parse the XML document by using ASP etc. PA> So can I assume that this is also true with PHP/Apache, ie, Apache has a PA> built in XML parser and I can use PHP fnuctions to parse my XML file on PA> the server side and thus "pump" out XHTML that is compatible with all PA> past and future browsers? You are partly correct there. Just because you are parsing XML to create XHTML documents, does not guarantee that it is compatible with all past and future browsers. You still have to worry about browser specifics as far as compatibility goes, because in the end, what you are sending to the browser is XHTML. PA> Also, what is the procedure that most of you (members of the PHP lists) PA> follow when dealing with XML. ie, do you go for the client side parsing PA> or do you do server side parsing. And how do you decide when to use XML PA> and when to stick to trusty old PHP/MySQL? ( Sorry, know this is PA> probably the dumbest question I can ask, but I really battle to see when PA> to use it, or rather WHY I should use it seeing that the data is PA> arguably "static" in nature ( I would either get the XML file from PA> somewhere else, or I would generate it from some source and pass it on, PA> effectively creating a little data island/snapshot of the actual data at PA> a point in time?) XML is one of those things that if someone explains it to you (atleast for me) it seems like a waste of time, but once you start using it, you'll see why its great. I can only give you a personal example. I thought XML was "nice" and worth knowing, but not mission critical for me .. that is, untill I found a free XML weather feed that I wanted to parse....which led to me writing my own PHP XML parser class for that feed. Anyhow, the point of XML is not data storage (like a database), rather, its to facilitate data translation and trasportation. XML is best for transferring data when you are not sure that a native format is compatible with your target platform or application. The best uses of XML that I have seen involve open streaming (like the weather feed example), data description (a few CMS programs allow the configuration files to be stored in XML format), legacy application conversion (for example, MSSQL 2000 can now work with XML data (import, export, etc.)). If you are struggling with the "is XML best for ____" type questions, then what you should really be asking is ... "what can I gain by making my application/system/etc. XML compatible"? Most of the times you will find that it is easier to implement XML compatibility in an application, even if you are not sure of its immediate use. A lot of major application vendors (like SAP) have now specified open XML standards that allow third party applications to communicate with their apps (as far as the enterprise level goes). Anyhow, just my $0.02 -- Regards, Burhan Khalid phplist[at]meidomus[dot]com http://www.meidomus.com -- PHP General Mailing List (http://www.php.net/) To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php
