What is XML?

These tutorials are about XML, the Extensible Markup Language.

This tutorial has seven (7) sub-sections.

What is XML?

XML is short for Extensible Markup Language. XML was specifically designed as a language for the creation of electronic documents.

extensible: an extensible language is one that comes with rules on how to modify with language without violating standards for that language

XML was specifically created to be extensible, which is to say it is designed to allow for the definition of new markup. The purpose of XML is not to mark up documents itself, but rather to define other document markup languages. Thus, what you use XML for is to create extentions to XML.

When you use XML to create an XML-based markup language, that language is said to be an application of XML.

Learning XML is not really about XML itself, but rather about learning the applications of XML and the rules of creating markup languages.

XML itself can be summed up in a couple of pages. Trying to cover all the things that relate to or have been created with XML is a field of study all by itself.

In this section we are going to take a look at the basics of XML, the general rules that govern it. Everything after this point will be about the tools and resources you need to create markup languages and to get XML to work effectively.

These pages can be found at: [http://academ.hvcc.edu/~kantopet/]
Copyright 2003 -- Peter L. Kantor[kantopet@hvcc.edu]
Last Updated January 2003