debate 3

Even though HyperText Markup Language has been the most extended markup language since the appearance of the Web, recent steps towards semantic integration brought up the necessity of a new tool capable of administrating data. This led to the creation of eXtended Marked Language.

While the sintaxis of XML and HTML is similar (they were both based on SGML), their functions and characteristics differ:

Both HTML and XML place tags around an element to describe it. HTML uses tags to determine the visual display (e.g. font size), whereas tags in XML indicate the category of each element (e.g. “city”, “date”, “name”…). This helps structure the content of the text.
Most HTML users put their attention only on getting the page look the way they want it to, even if the structure behind it is left disorganized. With XML, documents won’t show up unless they’re correctly constructed (well formed), thus forcing an arrangement to be respected. The format of XML documents makes them portable to different platforms and allows structured data coming from other sources to be combined easily.
HTML tags are predefined and limited. Instead, XML lets users create their own tags to classify elements with more precision. As an example, if we had every book written by Shakespeare marked as such, we’d be able to access a list to all of them. With the current methods, however, performing a search about “books” and “Shakespeare” gives us mixed results between works written by him and about him.
The internet is now heading towards eXtended HyperText Markup Language. XHTML is a hybrid of XML and HTML, where information is described in one layer and given the format needed to present it in a browser separately.

References:

Objetivos y usos del XML (2001, June 21). In DesarrolloWeb.com, by Miguel Ángel Álvarez. Retrieved December 12, 2008.
¿Cómo se diferencia el XML del HTML? (2003, November 11). In Maestros del Web, by Christian Van Der Henst S.. Retrieved December 10, 2008.
¿Por qué XML? (2003, April 17). In GAMAROD. Retrieved December 13, 2008.
Tutorial de XML en Flash (2004, April 5). In Cristalab, by Freddie. Retrieved December 10, 2008.

XML (2008, November 28). In Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Retrieved December 11, 2008.

Ainhize Leon, Aiora Juaristi, Ana Cristina Guerra, Ayanta García, Maialen Etxeberria, María Losada.