XML editor
From Free net encyclopedia
An XML editor is a markup language editor with added functionality to facilitate the editing of XML. This could be done in plain text in a text editor such as Vim, with all the code visible. Specific XML editors, however, have facilties like word-completion and menus and buttons for tasks that are common in XML editing, based on data supplied with DTD. Examples of such editors are:
There are also graphical XML editors that hide the code in the background and present the content to the user in a more user-friendly format, approximating the rendered version. This is helpful for situations where people who are not fluent in XML code need to enter information in XML based documents such as time sheets and expenditure reports. And even if the user is familiar with XML, use of such editors, that take care of syntax details, is often faster and more convenient. These are often called WYSIWYG editors, but not all of them are WYSIWYG: graphical XML editors can be WYSIWYG (when they try to display the final rendering) or WYSIWYM (when they try to display the actual meaning of XML elements). Users often look for WYSIWYG XML editors when they don't understand that the goal of XML is to separate the meaning of the elements (which is supposed to be encoded in an adapted XML language) from the way they are displayed (which is supposed to be defined for instance in an XSL or CSS stylesheet).
Using a WYSIWYG editor effectively prevents users from creating documents with a meaning, because they only see a graphical rendering and will change the XML elements (and hence the meaning of the document) in order to get a different graphical result. For instance, someone creating a web page could use a H2 element (meaning: second level title) instead of H1 (meaning: first level title) because it looks smaller on their current display. In this case, they are not only changing the meaning of the title, but the result won't even be the same for everyone because the rendering depends on the browser used.
Graphical editors include:
- Conglomerate XML editor
- Stylus Studio
- Altova Authentic and XMLSpy
- XMetaL Author and XMAX
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External links
Lists of XML editors
- http://ahds.ac.uk/creating/information-papers/xml-editors/ Choosing an XML editor - A review of 23 XML editors, benchmarked against 30 different features
- http://programming.newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=05/02/24/1650248 Open Source XML Editors Examined - A review that covers a selection of open source XML editors.
- Editors Long list from xml.com
- Editors open directory list
XML editors
- Jaxe - configurable Java XML editor (open source)
- <oXygen/> XML Editor, Schema Editor and XSLT Debugger a multiplatform XML editor with a Buy once run everywhere license policy
- Altova XMLSpy XML editor with free and commercial versions
- EditiX XML Editor and XSLT Debugger
- XMetaL Author
- XMAX
- XMetaL Author DITA Edition
- http://www.conglomerate.org/ Web page for Conglomerate editor
- http://kdewebdev.org/ Quanta Plus Web Development tool from KDE Web DEV
- XMLFox Freeware XML and XSD schema Editor.
- xmlBlueprint XML Editor Fast XML Editor for Windows
- XML Marker Free XML Editor with tree grid and text views (freeware).
Other links