Oracle XML Handbook (Oracle Press Series) Book

The seven Oracle employees who wrote this book have a vast wealth of experience between them and have poured it with a liberal hand into this timely tome. XML (eXtensible markup language) is very much the "next big thing" for database administrators in an increasingly Internet-aware business world.HTML (hypertext markup language) has been the language of Web page descriptions for some while, handling relatively small amounts of text with lots of information about how that text is displayed by a browser. However, HTML is poor at handling data with a more formal structure such as that used by relational database engines. This is just the sort of information that businesses have an increasing need to exchange--so-called B2B transactions. The Internet is the ideal conduit and XML is gaining popularity as the medium for the exchange because it can encapsulate both the data and its structure.This book is not a general purpose XML primer for the beginner, it's highly geared towards Oracle's XML implementation. At present, possibly because so much of it is new, XML feels very much like a series of bolt-ons to the main Oracle product rather than a fully integrated part of the package. Precisely because of this, the XML Handbook is so useful because it pulls together all the disparate elements and covers the whole Oracle approach.Among expected topics like the XML Developer's Kit (XDK), Java tools and development for Oracle8i and Oracle Application Server come surprising but welcome chapters on the Internet File Server (IFS) and on future trends. These inclusions surprise as they aren't directly relevant to XML but, coming from people in the thick of Oracle development, they make interesting reading.For Oracle users who need to get into Oracle-style XML, this is a great resource; if you don't need the Oracle slant, however, look elsewhere for a guide to XML. --Mark WhitehornRead More