Rating: 
Summary: This book is worth your attention
Review: An excellent and comprehensive description of XML. Very up to date. The author gives a clear summary of the history of XML and where the various portions stand. He is to be commended for having a colour diagram on the inside cover, summarising the many specifications that are part of XML or associated with it, like XPath, XLink, JDOM, JAXP, DOM. Affiliated with this is a large pull out colour chart, that gives the time line and status of the components. The book is near exhaustive in its description of these components. You would do well to constantly refer to these two diagrams. Pin the chart above your computer! This may sound trivial to some. But when you are digging your way through a detailed set of examples in the book, it really helps to have a schematic overview to place things in perspective. All the more so if you happen to be new to many of the topics. Even experienced users can benefit. The book has a CD with full listings of the examples. A great time saver. Also, since the author did not provide problem sets, you can easily make up your own, based on the CD. For example, suppose you are looking at Chapter 8, "Parsing with the DOM". Take an example document and its DTD from the CD. Change the DTD to add more elements and attributes. Make some of these mandatory. Run the parser on the document and the DTD. You should get errors, as expected, because the document is missing some new required items. Understand the error messages. Then correct the document by adding instances of those items. Rerun the parser. Any errors? If not, then try adding more to the DTD and document. This will really help you learn. You can quickly build up documents of some nontrivial complexity. Of course, you can, and should, do analogous things with the other chapters. In terms of the reader's background (I'm talking to you): You can come from either a formal programming environment, or from a publishing/designer background. In both cases, you should already be well familiar with HTML. This is not a formal prerequisite, but a lot of things in the book really do come easier if you know HTML. The programming examples in the book are usually in java, but the author emphasises that XML is not a procedural programming language like java. Rather, it is a declarative language, where you make templates. In this sense, XML is closer to HTML than to java or C. This book is worth your attention.
Rating:
Summary: A thorough and integrated guide to the important specs
Review: Ken Sall not only guides the reader through each of the chief specifications in the XML "family" of technologies, but provides an integrated understanding of how these technologies relate to and enhance each other. The references provided in each chapter are exhaustive, and the accompanying CD and Web site make finding and experimenting with them and with the related tools a snap. The writing is lucid and entertaining. Highly recommended.
Rating:
Summary: Thorough reference for developers and architects
Review: This book is a comprehensive and up-to-date (as of this review) reference on XML as defined by the W3C. Part I is more of a desk reference (with a lot of example code), which covers XML syntax, modeling and parsing, DTDs and schemas. Part II, also with many examples, is a complete treatment of parsing with APIs, with separate chapters on SAX, DOM, JDOM and JAXP. Transformation and display protocols are covered in Part III, including CSS2, XSLT and XPath. XSLFO for formatting is also covered in this part. Xlink and Xpointer to facilitate referencing operations are the subjects of Part IV, and the book wraps up the formal descriptions of the family of specifications in Part V, which covers XHTML and RDF. I have a personal interest in RDF, and found the chapter devoted to it complete, but terse. This characterizes all of the chapters in this book. What makes this book valuable is the way the information is displayed. Each chapter starts with either an overview or concepts, and each clearly explains each specification and gives clear examples to demonstrate how they work in practice. Appendices at the back of the book are especially valuable because they summarize much of the information in the body of the book. For example, Appendix A depicts the family of specifications in a format that clearly shows the relationships among them. In addition, the web site that supports the book provides a lot of supplementary material, including over 900 links to related resources and an image map of the family of specifications that is one of the most visually appealing and informative resources one can have at their disposal. Note that the web site is not up-to-date - some information that was cited as coming in April and May were still not online as of late June. This is not a book for learning XML as much as it's a reference. The main value over W3C material that is available over the web is the clear writing and many examples. It reads much better than dry specs and is complete in its coverage.
Rating:
Summary: Thorough reference for developers and architects
Review: This book is a comprehensive and up-to-date (as of this review) reference on XML as defined by the W3C. Part I is more of a desk reference (with a lot of example code), which covers XML syntax, modeling and parsing, DTDs and schemas. Part II, also with many examples, is a complete treatment of parsing with APIs, with separate chapters on SAX, DOM, JDOM and JAXP. Transformation and display protocols are covered in Part III, including CSS2, XSLT and XPath. XSLFO for formatting is also covered in this part. Xlink and Xpointer to facilitate referencing operations are the subjects of Part IV, and the book wraps up the formal descriptions of the family of specifications in Part V, which covers XHTML and RDF. I have a personal interest in RDF, and found the chapter devoted to it complete, but terse. This characterizes all of the chapters in this book. What makes this book valuable is the way the information is displayed. Each chapter starts with either an overview or concepts, and each clearly explains each specification and gives clear examples to demonstrate how they work in practice. Appendices at the back of the book are especially valuable because they summarize much of the information in the body of the book. For example, Appendix A depicts the family of specifications in a format that clearly shows the relationships among them. In addition, the web site that supports the book provides a lot of supplementary material, including over 900 links to related resources and an image map of the family of specifications that is one of the most visually appealing and informative resources one can have at their disposal. Note that the web site is not up-to-date - some information that was cited as coming in April and May were still not online as of late June. This is not a book for learning XML as much as it's a reference. The main value over W3C material that is available over the web is the clear writing and many examples. It reads much better than dry specs and is complete in its coverage.
Rating:
Summary: A Comprehensive Book on W3C XML Specifications
Review: This book is an excellent guide to the various W3C XML specifications. This book is well-organized and well-written. It provides an easy-to-understand overview of the various W3C XML specifications. This books provides a clear roadmap of W3C XML specifications and how they relate to core XML. It also touches on a few non-W3C XML specifications (SAX, RELAX NG, JDOM) which are important to the overall understanding of XML technologies. This book provides an informed overview of the use of these technologies. I recommend this book as a must for any XML library.
Rating:
Summary: A Comprehensive Book on W3C XML Specifications
Review: This book is an excellent guide to the various W3C XML specifications. This book is well-organized and well-written. It provides an easy-to-understand overview of the various W3C XML specifications. This books provides a clear roadmap of W3C XML specifications and how they relate to core XML. It also touches on a few non-W3C XML specifications (SAX, RELAX NG, JDOM) which are important to the overall understanding of XML technologies. This book provides an informed overview of the use of these technologies. I recommend this book as a must for any XML library.
Rating:
Summary: great book. Must have for CS students.
Review: This book is not an "how to" guide, nor does it claim to be one. I mean by this that if you are, say a Java programmer looking for a book that concretely shows you how to integrate xml with Java then you would be better off with one of the so many Java/XML books on the market. However, if in your work or your studies you feel that you need to gain a more thorough understanding of the W3C specifications related to XML, then this is the book to buy. All the W3C specs are available for free on the web. The trouble is, W3C documents are designed to provide a precise definition of a standards, they are not designed to be especially intelligible by mere mortals (however technologically enclined). Some are quite readable, others far less. Firstly, I really like that this book present all the relevant specifications and working drafts in perspective. Secondly, I found that it does a remarkably good job at translating these specifications (without simplifying them) in understandable terms. In my work, I am interested in gaining as thorough as possible a view of XMl technologies and this book helps me greatly. I also like the fact that it present a well-organized bibliography at the end of each chapter (sadly many computer books from Wrox, O'reilly, Que an like don't have a bibiography as if to say "everything inside this book comes straight from the author's mind. DO not look any further). I have reviewed for myself around twenty XML books. I found this book to be one of my top favorite. I recommend it especially for:
- CS students or programmer with a theoretical bent.
- anybody who wants to get a thorough overview of W3C standards.
Rating:
Summary: great book. Must have for CS students.
Review: This book is not an "how to" guide, nor does it claim to be one. I mean by this that if you are, say a Java programmer looking for a book that concretely shows you how to integrate xml with Java then you would be better off with one of the so many Java/XML books on the market. However, if in your work or your studies you feel that you need to gain a more thorough understanding of the W3C specifications related to XML, then this is the book to buy. All the W3C specs are available for free on the web. The trouble is, W3C documents are designed to provide a precise definition of a standards, they are not designed to be especially intelligible by mere mortals (however technologically enclined). Some are quite readable, others far less. Firstly, I really like that this book present all the relevant specifications and working drafts in perspective. Secondly, I found that it does a remarkably good job at translating these specifications (without simplifying them) in understandable terms. In my work, I am interested in gaining as thorough as possible a view of XMl technologies and this book helps me greatly. I also like the fact that it present a well-organized bibliography at the end of each chapter (sadly many computer books from Wrox, O'reilly, Que an like don't have a bibiography as if to say "everything inside this book comes straight from the author's mind. DO not look any further). I have reviewed for myself around twenty XML books. I found this book to be one of my top favorite. I recommend it especially for:
- CS students or programmer with a theoretical bent.
- anybody who wants to get a thorough overview of W3C standards.
Rating: 
Summary: Thorough in its explanations, lots of additional references
Review: This is an excellent book to understand, develop and code XML. However, in the parsing discussions (chp 7-10) an understanding of OOP and Java programming are almost required. Other than that, it is an excellent text.
Rating:
Summary: best on the market
Review: This is the most thorough, comprehensive, and comprehensible book on the market to cover the full range of latest XML technologies. I think it is great!
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