Chapter 6

Putting It All Together

The Client Side

Clients can be equipped for XML to varying degrees.
At minimum, for XML they must have a parser.
More powerful clients have stylesheet processing and other features.
Lab 6A
XML can be rendered directly by browsers if they are suitably equipped.

The Server Side

Typically, the server side consists of a legacy application, a web server, and software that serves as the glue between them.

Typically, this software is written in Java and can be developed relatively quickly and cheaply.

Other languages (notably, Perl) and development environments (notably, Microsoft) are available.

A popular XML-based protocol is Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP).

Consider the architecture of the server side.

Lab 6B

There is much in common between XML and relational databases. For discussion:

Why do applications often combine these technologies?
What XML structures are equivalent to tables, rows, columns, primary keys, foreign keys, join-tables?
Where is the analogy weak?
At the W3C, much consideration has been given to XML representation of relational databases.
IBM offers eleven rules for moving a relational database to XML.

Delivering on the XML Promise

XML and e-commerce -- B2C and especially B2B
Transcends programming languages and computing platforms
Integrates business applications with web sites
Application-to-application information exchange
Many organizations and vendors
Applications:
- XML and network and systems management
- Supply-chain integration (an Internet-enabled version of EDI)
- On-line trading communities
- Retrofit legacy apps
- Many more

Chapter 6

Putting It All Together

The Client Side

Lab 6A

The Server Side

Lab 6B

Delivering on the XML Promise

And So We Have Seen...