Ships from: acton, MA
Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Ships from: Chatham, NJ
Usually ships in 1-2 business days
This guide will arm you with the nuts-and-bolts information and tools you'll need to exploit XML's powerful capabilities. Focusing specifically on how XML works with database technologies—including relational and object-oriented databases—the book provides clear technical coverage of the key issues involved with storing XML in databases and using databases with XML applications.Expert Liam Quin first introduces you to the main concepts of XML and then reveals how to work with this technology. He offers helpful tips and techniques to show you how to move data stored in relational databases in and out of an XML application. You'll also learn how to store XML documents in a database, find and use the best XML database tools and applications, and store links in a database for metadata access. You'll also gain a better understanding of W3C specifications for XQL, XSL, Xlink, and Xpointer. Programmers, Web developers, and technical managers who need to extract database contents as XML or store XML in a database will find this book to be an invaluable resource. This book concentrates on techniques rather than specific tools, but mentions a wide range of software, both commercial and open source, including:
About the Author:
LIAM QUIN was a member of the W3C Standards Committee for XML. He has been working with SGML since 1987 and was closely involved with XML from its inception. He is the coauthor of the XML Specification Guide and has published papers on SGML. Quin is also a frequent speaker at numerous conferences and is very active in standards committees.
Welcome to The Open Source XML Database Toolkit. This book is not just for people who write code, but also for those who design and specify programs. There are chapters to introduce XML and databases of various types, and chapters to explain how to use them together, all in an open source environment.
This book, as is obvious from its title, is about open source software. Most of the tools discussed are open source. Open source software is software that is distributed with its program source code, under a license that allows you to modify and redistribute that source code. In other words, if you don't like the way the program works, you are free to change it. People sometimes think that open source software refers to software that is free of charge, but that's not the case. Software in the context of open source is software that you are free to change and to use in any way you wish, as long as you don't try to restrict that freedom from other people.
That said, note that most open source software is distributed more or less free of charge, with development costs paid for by support fees, services, or even donations (there may be media and shipping charges, of course).
Also note that this book does mention software that is not open source, usually when the software is very significant or when there are no open source competitors. Even if the most appropriate tool is not free, it's better to use it than to be held back by ideology or dogma. Here are some examples of nonfree software mentioned in this book:
The eXtensible Markup Language, XML, is a way of defining simple text-based representations of arbitrarily complex structured information. The term XML is also used to refer to data that's marked up in a format defined using XML.
This is a book about working with XML. You might have XML documents that you need to store in a database, or you might want to use XML as an interchange format.
Chapter 1 in Part One, "Just Enough XML", introduces the main concepts of XML.
This is also book about using databases. You'll find an introduction to the Structured Query Language, SQL, in Chapter 3, "Just Enough SQL."
The book doesn't only address relational databases, though. You'll find descriptions of hashing (Chapter 12: "Dynamic Hashing: ndbm"), of object-oriented databases (Chapter 10, "Introduction to Object-Oriented Databases," and Chapter 11, "XML as Classes and Objects"), and of text retrieval databases (Chapter 13, "Text Retrieval Technology Overview").
In all cases, the emphasis is on using XML and databases together in an open source environment.
As in all the best toolkits, there are lots of toys to play with. Most of them are listed for reference in Part Five, "Resource Guide." The toolkit approach means that this book does not go deeply into any single product or tool, but instead focuses on using tools together. Chapter 2, "Client/Server Architecture," introduces network programming, but from then on, the idea of using applications together pervades the book.
The power lies in the way the tools work together. Not only are these open source tools, meaning you can change them to make them work together in the way you want, but they are also widely used and powerful tools, meaning you probably won't have to change them.
Welcome to the open source revolution.
The illustrations in printed books generally have to use crisp lines, as if everything was polished and perfect. But don't be deceived by this. A quick sketch on the back of an envelope, or on a whiteboard, can help people to understand the relationships between components where a textual description cannot. Never hesitate to draw pictures, and don't worry if they are not very polished.
I've tried to keep things simple in this regard. In the few places where I've shown a session at an interactive terminal or shell, the prompt is given as the pound sign () if you need to be logged in as root, and as the dollar sign ($) otherwise. The text you type is in bold. Here's a brief example:
The dollar sign on the third line shows the prompt after the command (pwd, print working directory) completed.
If you are thinking that this looks suspiciously like a Unix (or Linux) shell, you're right. If you're using Microsoft Windows, don't despair--there's a lot you can learn from this book. But if you want to write reliable high-performance database applications, you should develop them on Unix if you can. Imagine going for a whole year of development without a single machine crash and you'll see why.
Source code is shown with function names in bold when they are defined. This is just for your convenience, since books don't have a search command. If you type the examples into the computer, or download them, they are plain text, with no formatting. In the same way, comments are shown in italics.
At the companion Web site for this book (www. wiley. com/compbooks/quin) you can find:
Other XML resources are added from time to time, and the "Resource Guide" is updated occasionally. And note, you may need your copy of the printed book ready before downloading the examples.
Overview
This guide will arm you with the nuts-and-bolts information and tools you'll need to exploit XML's powerful capabilities. Focusing specifically on how XML works with database technologies—including relational and object-oriented databases—the book provides clear technical coverage of the key issues involved with storing XML in databases and using databases with XML applications.Expert Liam Quin first introduces you ...