Master

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s Thesis 2006 

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STUTTGART

TECHNIK

Background 

        STUTTGART UNIVERSITY OF APPLIED 

SCIENCES 

2.6  XML Document Parsing 

Extensible  Markup  Language  (XML)  is  a  simple,  very  flexible  text  format  derived 

from  Standard  Generalized  Markup  Language  (SGML)  (ISO  8879).  Originally 

designed  to  meet  the  challenges  of  large scale  electronic  publishing,  XML  is  also 

playing an increasingly important role in the exchange of a wide variety of data on the 

Web and elsewhere. 

More and more enterprise and Java technology projects are making use of XML as a 

medium to store data in a portable fashion. But due to the increased processing power 

demanded by XML parsers, J2ME applications have largely been left out of this trend. 

Now, however, small footprint XML parsers for the Java language are emerging that 

will allow MIDP programmers to take advantage of the power of XML. 

2.6.1  XML parser overview 

An XML processing  model describes the steps an application should take to process 

XML; an application that implements such a model is called an XML parser. You can 

integrate  an  XML  parser  into  your  Java  applications  with  the  Java  API  for  XML 

Processing  (JAXP).  JAXP  allows  applications  to  parse  and  transform  XML 

documents  using  an  API  that  is  independent  of  any  particular  XML  processor 

implementation.  Through  a  plug in  scheme,  developers  can  change  XML  processor 

implementations without altering their applications.   

The XML parsing process operates in three phases:   

1.

XML  input  processing.  In  this  stage, the  application  parses  and  validates  the 

source  document;  recognizes  and  searches  for  relevant  information  based  on 

its  location  or  its  tagging  in  the  source  document;  extracts  the  relevant 

information  when  it  is  located;  and,  optionally,  maps  and  binds  the  retrieved 

information to business objects.   

2.

Business logic handling. This is the stage in which the actual processing of the 

input  information  takes  place.  It  might  result  in  the  generation  of  output 

information.   

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