Should you adopt XML? XML templates are a perfect interface to the database

Please listen to me first and then decide whether or not to believe my point. If you think a website is made up of an HTML web directory, it would be best if we go back to the 20th century. Today a successful website is mainly composed of XML code and a database.

Of course, HTML() has its purpose, and it's the root of XML(). For both, the creation of tags, the structure of the tags, and many of the tags themselves are the same. But HTML only allows you to create static web pages for web browsers. If you want to create 21st century web pages, you have to use XML.

XML is a system that allows you to build your own tags instead of relying on the definition of The World Wide Web Consortium http://. Originally, in order to define new content needs, people established many labels, and as the number of new labels increased, many suggestions for or against these proposals flocked to it. In order to break this stalemate, the association was established.

However, the benefits of XML are not only those above.

XML also allows you to define any type of table. It allows you to browse and fill out those forms on your own website. You can also forward the results to your computer in any format (or on your business partner's computer). This makes XML enough to replace the Electronic Data Interchange (Electronic Data Interchange), an electronic pricing system established in the 1980s.

With XML, standard business forms can be delivered over the Internet and eventually forwarded to the original host. Most industries now have XML standards bodies - such as advertising adXML () - to deal with standard forms (and tags) issues. You should find and join this organization in your industry.

XML allows you to separate your own content from the presentation so that you can create presentation systems or templates for interactive television, broadband, personal digital assistants (PDAs), and other wireless devices. The device ensures that your website can be directed to the correct template, and that you do not have to edit every page. As long as you change the template, the face of the entire site will change.

However, the most important thing is that for database, XML template is a perfect interface. Today, all major websites are based on databases, because most computer data consists of databases.

Your company may have thousands of different databases, such as customers, company development blueprints, products, personnel appointments, and financial information. Once your content becomes a database, you can make the entire company's business information available in a small box, just like the online search site Google (if your content is not yet a database, Google can guide you to create. For more information, visit the site at #custom_site.

With XML, all databases can be put on your website. You will need buttons, tabs, and a series of directories about the main content of the site, but in order to create a site that can accommodate unlimited content, you also need to build it into a database. You have no other choice on this issue.

Since I started in late 1994, I have been specializing in networking. One of the best examples I can cite here is a website that has both XML and a database. The website was launched on my online career, called iQVC(). This site is a very popular one at home. Shopping channel.

The basic website design of the IQVC website has changed little since it was put into operation in 1995. Its goal is to become a website that is not the same as his parent company QVC. On this site, the company can provide thousands of products instead of the dozens of things on television.

First, iQVC established a huge catalog database. Since QVC already has tens of thousands of customers, iQVC immediately connected the database to the site. Because QVC sales are based on the personal contact between the radio host and the customer, iQVC has established a forum. The forum can also be built as a database. And from the beginning, iQVC connected these databases to other networks.

It is very difficult to establish a database of products and a search engine interaction system. Of course, you will expect to create static web pages that search engines can search for. But iQVC was right from the beginning, that is to separate content and presentations and build their own commercial database. As a result, iQVC has become one of the most respected big merchants on the Web and one of the most profitable businesses.

So be sure to learn and use XML. If you have to invest a sum of money, put the money into the database and database design. And separate your data and presentations, you can save and be able to find these things, your website will be able to run very well.

Dana Blankenhorn is a business reporter with more than 20 years of working experience. He has written 5 books in collaboration with others. The most recent book is called Web Commerce: Building a Digital Business with Kate Maddox ( And Kate Madhos do e-commerce). He writes for Boardwatch and NetMarketing magazines, ClickZ.com, Intellectual Capital.com, Andover.net, and his own website a-clue.com. Dana Blankenhearn now lives in Atlanta, Georgia, the capital of the United States.