Learning XML (Paperback)

Author Erik T Ray begins with an excellent summary of XML's history as an outgrowth of SGML and HTML. He outlines very clearly the elements of markup, demystifying concepts such as attributes, entities and namespaces with numerous clear examples. To illustrate a real-world XML application, he gives the reader a look at a document written in DocBook--a publicly available XML document type for publishing technical writings--and explains the sections of the document step by step. A simplified version of DocBook is used later in the book to illustrate transformation--a powerful benefit of XML.

The all-important Document Type Definition (DTD) is covered in depth, but the still-unofficial alternative--XML Schema--is only briefly addressed. The author makes liberal use of graphical illustrations, tables and code to demonstrate concepts along the way, keeping the reader engaged and on track. Ray also gets into a deep discussion of programming XML utilities with Perl.

Learning XML is a highly readable introduction to XML for readers with existing knowledge of markup and Web technologies, and it meets its goals very well--to deliver a broad perspective of XML and its potential. --Stephen W Plain

Review
'Learning XML does what it sets out to do: provides an introduction to SML concepts and XML document authoring and the related standards and, as such, represents an ideal starting point for anyone using XML.' IT Training, August 2001 'O'Reilly books have a good record. Well-know for their 'in a Nutshell series and their zoological cover illustrations, I've always found them highly satisfactory. There cannot be many works that be referred to familiarly as, for instance, The Camel Book. Well now we have The Newly-Hatched Chick book. From the title of this one I had somehow (wrongly) expected an XML primer covering only basics, but this is a thorough treatment of the subject. The book's general layout conforms to what we have become familiar with in O'Reilly'. The index is excellent and there are appendices giving a glossary and lists of standards, tools, books and resources and where to find them. Learning XML, very readable as well as being a good reference, is strongly recommended.' - Sandy McCourt, uk-bug developer's magazine, July/August 2001 'As you would expect from this publisher, the text is pleasantly presented in a way that makes it comfortable to read. I settled down to read it on a three-hour coach journey to visit my aging parents (the relevance of this is that, like reading in the bath, I had few resources other than my eyes with which to understand what the author was writing about.) What I particularly appreciate is the way the author uses practical examples (oh, and read some of the text in these, it can be hilarious) and then uses an endnote style commentary to highlight the important elements. I find this much better than the style of perverting the commenting facility of a language. For example, in chapter 5, Document Models: A Higher Level of Control he use the 'Barebones DocBook' DTD as his final consolidating example of DTDs. The approach in this book works well with the way I like to read to learn. I would definitely recommend this book to programmers wanting to get to grips with XML.' - Francis Glassborow, Cvu, April 2001

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