Why bother with Extensible Markup Language (XML)?
XML was adopted as a syntax for X3D in order to solve a number of real problems: • Rehostability – VRML 97 syntax is foreign to all but the VRML community. It is similar to the Open Inventor scene graph syntax on which it is based, and to some object notations. Nevertheless the dominant syntax in world-wide use is XML. Markup has proved to be the best solution to the long life-cycle problems of data archival and rehosting. • Page integration – XML page-based integration goes directly to ther web pages, in both content and implementation. • Integration with the next-generation web technologies – The members of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) are putting a lot of effort into the development of XML. XML Web services are the fundamental building block in the move to distributed computing on the Internet. Open standards and the focus on communication and collaboration among people and applications have created an environment where XML Web services are becoming the platform for applicati
