XML Reference Guide

Mar 14, 2003

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I've spent a lot of time talking about XML in "real" programming languages such as Java, C++, PHP, and so on, but you can use XML principles and APIs in any language in which there implemented. That includes the browser scripting language, JavaScript, which actually had a "document object model" long before XML was even a twinkle in Tim Bray's eye.

Called "DOM Level 0," it was a way to identify, reference, and manipulate nodes in an HTML document. And since XML sprang from HTML (and is the basis for XHTML) it should come as no surprise that most modern browsers have implemented support for the XML Document Object Model to at least some extent.

In this section, were going to look at using this capability on a site near and dear to my heart: InformIT.com.

You may have noticed that while the left-hand navigation is organized as a tree, has little "plus" and "minus" graphics like a typical tree, and is organized as a tree, it doesn't actually behave as a tree. When you click on the little plus sign next to "DOM", for example, you do expand that node, but you have to reload the entire page to do it.

Today were going to look at a potential way to change that.

Were going to use the fact that an HTML page is organized much like an XML document, and can be treated as such. For example, we can use the DOM API to reference a particular node, or object. Once we've done that, we can adjust properties for that particular object.

For example, consider this block of HTML:

<html>
<head>
   <base href="http://www.informit.com" />
   <style type="text/css">

      div { display: block; }
      .dhead {position: relative; left: 20px;}
   </style>
</head>
<body>
      <div>
         <img src="/display/common/images/icons/plus.gif" alt="Collapse" />
         <a href="/guides/content.asp?g=xml&seqNum=8">The Document Object Model</a>

         <div class="dhead" style="display: block;">
              <img src="/display/common/images/icons/plus.gif" alt="Expand" />
              <a href="/guides/content.asp?g=xml&seqNum=9">Informit Articles and Sample Chapters</a>
         </div>
         <div class="dhead" style="display: block;">

              <img src="/display/common/images/icons/plus.gif" alt="Expand" />
              <a href="/guides/content.asp?g=xml&seqNum=10">Books and e-Books</a>
         </div>
         <div class="dhead" style="display: block;">
              <img src="/display/common/images/icons/plus.gif" alt="Expand" />

              <a href="/guides/content.asp?g=xml&seqNum=11">Official Documentation</a>
         </div>
     </div>
     <div>
         <img src="/display/common/images/icons/plus.gif" alt="Expand" />

         <a href="/guides/content.asp?g=xml&seqNum=12">DOM and Java</a>
          <div class="dhead" style="display: block;">
              <img src="/display/common/images/icons/plus.gif" alt="Expand" />
              <a href="guides/content.asp?g=xml&seqNum=14">Informit Articles and Sample Chapters</a>

          </div>
          <div class="dhead" style="display: block;">
              <img src="/display/common/images/icons/plus.gif" alt="Expand" />
              <a href="/guides/content.asp?g=xml&seqNum=15">Books and e-Books</a>
          </div>

          <div class="dhead" style="display: block;">
              <img src="/display/common/images/icons/plus.gif" alt="Expand" />
              <a href="/guides/content.asp?g=xml&seqNum=16">Official Documentation</a>
          </div>
        
     </div>

     <div>
          <img src="/display/common/images/icons/plus.gif" alt="Expand" />
          <a href="/guides/content.asp?g=xml&seqNum=17">DOM and .NET</a>
          <div class="dhead" style="display: block;">(and so on)</div>

     </div>
     <div>
          <img src="/display/common/images/icons/plus.gif" alt="Expand" />
          <a href="/guides/content.asp?g=xml&seqNum=21">DOM and C++</a>
          <div class="dhead" style="display: block;">(and so on)</div>

     </div>
     <div>
          <img src="/display/common/images/icons/plus.gif" alt="Expand" />
          <a href="/guides/content.asp?g=xml&seqNum=23">DOM and Perl</a>
          <div class="dhead" style="display: block;">(and so on)</div>

     </div>
     <div>
          <img src="/display/common/images/icons/plus.gif" alt="Expand" />
          <a href="/guides/content.asp?g=xml&seqNum=25">DOM and PHP</a>
          <div class="dhead" style="display: block;">(and so on)</div>

     </div>
     <div>
          <img src="/display/common/images/icons/plus.gif" alt="Expand" />
          <a href="/guides/content.asp?g=xml&seqNum=27">DOM Level 3</a>
          <div class="dhead" style="display: block;">(and so on)</div>

     </div>
  </div>
</body>
</html>

(You may have to scroll the code to the left to see the toggle script added to the images.) If we allow the browser to render it, it looks like this:

email information@informit.com.

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