Day 16. Integrating XML with J2EE

Today, we take a bit of a departure from J2EE and its emphasis on programming elements to look at what is fast becoming the lingua franca of the Internet—the Extensible Markup Language (XML).

Throughout the book so far, you have seen many ways in which XML is used within J2EE applications to describe the structure and layout of the application. Today and tomorrow, you will study XML and its associated APIs and standards to gain a fuller understanding of how XML can be used to exchange data between different components in your applications.

Today, you will learn about

• How XML has evolved from the need for platform-independent data exchange

• The relationship between XML and both Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML) and Hypertext Markup Language (HTML)

• How to create well-formed and valid XML documents

• The Java API for XML Processing (JAXP)

• How to process XML documents with the Simple API for XML (SAX) and the Document Object Model (DOM)

• How XML is used in the J2EE platform

This book is about J2EE, of which XML is just a component. To learn more about XML, take a look at Sams Teach Yourself XML in 21 Days, which covers everything you need to know about XML and related standards.