XML by Example

This book is excellent for someone who knows HTML basics and who wants to learn XML. The author does not use only examples, but also comparisons, which are really helpful. For example, XML is structure-oriented and not presentation-oriented, compared to HTML, this book explains the advantage of this difference. The presentation is clear, key notions as Namespace, Style Sheets, Dom and Sax, XLink and XPointer are all introduced in chapter one with examples, and explained in more detail in later chapters. It tells you also how to read this book, for example, chapter 3 is a little abstract, and at the beginning of this chapter, the author suggests you to skip half part and read this chapter later. The author repeats some notions several times, it may be helpful for beginner, but not for advanced. This book covers lots of topics, but not in depth. Overall, it is best suited for beginners. Int/adv readers better read >, <<XML unleashed>>, <<XSLT programmers reference>>, <<XML Elements of Style>> and other java/asp xml related books.

I found this book to be excellent to start learning XML. If you want to understand what XML is all about without getting into scholastics, buy it. It doesn't overwhelm the reader with endless empiric discussions and takes the shortest routes to get you to the point. That is what makes this book valuable for professional programmers who need a quick "jump-start" on XML. The examples are simple and easy to understand. However you should clearly understand that this book is not about sophisticated applications of XML. If you are already familiar with the basic concepts of XML and have some practical experience with it, you most likely will not find this book very useful.

"~I decided to buy three XML books after reading customer reviews here. Needless to say I am not disappointed with them. This book especially is excellent - if you think you want to get big perspective first and then attack XML/CSS/XSL/SAX in detail ... this is the book to start with. I only wish XSL was better explained, but as the author rightly points out that XSL is still evolving - nothing to complain. Nice examples. book.

The best XML book out there! It thoroughly explains XML and its uses, but any XML book can do that. What makes this book special is its chapters on XML's companion standards, which actually make it useful. The book begins with XML syntax, DTDs and Namespaces. It then moves on to the fun stuff: XSL, CSS, using the DOM and the SAX API in parsers. With that foundation, it walks you through creating XML documents inside applications. The book wraps up with a detailed N-Tiered Architecture example, which was thankfully written in Java. The author was kind enough to include a crash course on Java in the Appendix.Overall, the examples were excellent and interesting. I have read four other XML books, including one with the same title, and this is the first where I could actually apply the examples in my real world projects.My office has a copy of most of the XML books out there, but this is the only one I'd recommend to developers at any level.

Some books have a heavy tendency to become immersed in the exciting technologies that they are writing about, without leaving much scope for the human aspect of learning. XML by example is without a doubt one of the most useful and easy to understand books that I've read in ages. The e-commerce and web based email examples alone are worth the price of the book and it is totally comprehensive. What impressed me about this book most is that it covers more than just the essential aspects of the DOM and XSL, by providing an introduction to Java, Java Server Pages (Jsp's), Java web servers, translation and e-commerce applications (all the code you need is right here). Also the links to resources and applications / tools that are free or open source, which guarantees you'll be up and running with the most cutting edge technology in no time. In a word the most straight forward and to the point book that I have had the pleasure of digesting for a long time. Delicious!