100 Best XML Books of All Time

This book presents an outstanding birds-eye view of the XML landscape. It s definitely not a programming book (though it does introduce some key XML programming issues). Rather, it s focused on key ideas you need to understand whatever you want to do with XML. That could be document management, web or print content delivery, application integration, B2B commerce, data storage, internationalization -- you name it.

Ray s day job is software developer and XML specialist at O Reilly. There, he s helped to implement a complete publishing solution, using DocBook-XML and Perl to produce books in print, on CD-ROM, and for online delivery. So he understands XML from the real-world point of view of someone with a job to do.

His first goal is to take on the big questions. First, What is XML? Ray attacks this question from multiple angles, introducing XML as a general-purpose information storage system, a markup language toolkit, and an open standard (or, increasingly, a collection of standards). What can (and can t) you do with XML? What s the history that led us here? And what tools do you need to get started?

Next, he introduces the basic building blocks of XML markup and all XML-derived languages: stuff you ll need to know regardless of your goals. Through easy examples, you ll understand elements, attributes, entities, and processing instructions -- and how they fit together in a well-formed XML document.

Then, it s on to representing information with XML -- in other words, understanding the nature and planning the structure of the documents you ll be using. Ray starts simply, then builds on his basic examples to discuss narrative documents with text flows, block and inline elements, and titled sections. Once you can handle those, he discusses more complex information modeling, as used in specialized markup languages such as VML.

This edition contains an entirely new chapter on XML Schemas -- what he calls the shepherds that keep documents from straying outside of the herd and causing trouble. Schemas, of course, have become hugely important. This is one of the best plain-English introductions to the topic we ve seen.

Ray then turns to presentation, introducing CSS stylesheets, basic usage, rule matching, properties, and more. A little later on, he returns to the subject -- this time with a complete introduction to XSL-FO that illuminates two powerful examples. The first is TEI-XML, a markup language for scholarly documents (Ray presents a Shakespearean sonnet, appropriately coded). The second is the immensely powerful DocBook -- which, as we ve observed, Ray knows inside and out.

Learning XML is superbly written. Clear explanations. Simple examples. Great metaphors and analogies. And excellent introductions to nearly every topic that matters, from links to presentation, transformation to internationalization. If you re just starting out with XML, you re lucky to have it. Bill Camarda

Bill Camarda is a consultant, writer, and web/multimedia content developer. His 15 books include Special Edition Using Word 2000 and Upgrading & Fixing Networks for Dummies, Second Edition.

Forget those funky robot toys that were all the rage in the '80s, XSLT (Extensible Stylesheet Transformations) is the ultimate transformer. This powerful language is expert at transforming XML documents into PDF files, HTML documents, JPEG files—virtually anything your heart desires. As useful as XSLT is, though, most people have a difficult time learning its many peculiarities. And now Version 2.0, while elegant and powerful, has only added to the confusion.

XSLT Cookbook, Second Edition wants to set the record straight. It helps you sharpen your programming skills and overall understanding of XSLT through a collection of detailed recipes. Each recipe breaks down a specific problem into manageable chunks, giving you an easy-to-grasp roadmap for integrating XSLT with your data and applications. No other XSLT book around employs this practical problem-solution-discussion format.

In addition to offering code recipes for solving everyday problems with XSLT 1.0, this new edition shows you how to leverage the improvements found in XSLT 2.0, such as how to simplify the string manipulation and date/time conversion processes. The book also covers XPath 2.0, a critical companion standard, as well as topics ranging from basic transformations to complex sorting and linking. It even explores extension functions on a variety of different XSLT processors and shows ways to combine multiple documents using XSLT. Code examples add a real-world dimension to each technique.

Whether you're just starting out in XSLT or looking for advanced techniques, you'll find the level of information you need in XSLT Cookbook, Second Edition.