A bit of Advice for some one who hasnt yet used XML

[Millzy01]

hi,
I'm thinking of starting a new project that i will use to display reports, the idea at the moment is to create a DLL that gets data from a SQL database and outputs it as a XML stream I will then read the stream and either display it in a windows form or in a IE browser. I will not be creating a XML file and I was wondering if this is a viable use of XML or if I should just export the data as a HTML steam instead for the browser and a recordset for the windows form.
What do you guys think?
Would it be of no benefit to use XML is this instance?

 

[Stretchwickster]

I think, although would appreciate verification from someone here, that whether stream or file you could apply a CSS file to the resultant XML in order to display it in a browser (I'm not sure how widely supported this is!). Another option would be to transform the data (i.e. filter it and convert it to HTML or some other text-based format) using XSLT. The advantage of either technique is that content and presentation are kept separate so, for example, multiple CSS or XSLT transformations could be provided to present the same data differently to different users.

Clive

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"To err is human, but to really foul things up you need a computer." (Paul Ehrlich)
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To get the best answers from this forum see: faq102-5096

 

[Stretchwickster]

I forgot to mention, for a bit more background on the various techniques, check out the XML Tutorials at

http://www.w3schools.com/

Clive

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"To err is human, but to really foul things up you need a computer." (Paul Ehrlich)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
To get the best answers from this forum see: faq102-5096