Excerpt
W3C XForms--XML powered Web forms--is an overhaul to HTML forms from 1993. On-line forms are critical to electronic commerce on the Internet, and the HTML forms design from 1993 is now beginning to show its age. The advent of XML on the Web, and the subsequent move to Web Services as a means of connecting disparate information technologies to deliver end-to-end customer solutions has now made XML documents central to the fabric of the Web.
XForms leverages the power of using XML in modeling, collecting and serializing user input. The XForms design enables simple browser-based interfaces for creating and editing XML documents with the client providing interactive support for ensuring that the XML document is valid. Thus, XForms enables the last mileof connecting the end user to Web Services.
XForms user agents provide an easy-to-use browser-based interface that enables the end-user to interact directly with information technologies that have been published as Web Services. As the Web moves from being a desktop-only phenomenon to a means of ubiquitous electronic access, Web transactions need to be available from a variety of end-user access devices ranging from desktop computers to smart phones. The XForms authored interface is well-suited for delivery to a variety of interaction modalities and end-user devices, thus assuring content developers the widest audience for their transaction based applications.
From the user's perspective, XForms revolutionizes the way business critical information is collected and published on the Web. A key consequence of this evolution is that information technologists can continue to model business data using abstract structures that are amenable to machine processing; XForms binds a user-friendly Web browser interface to such abstract XML models, thereby empowering the end-user to edit and update these abstract structures. In this sense, XForms enables a standard Web browser to associate editable views to the underlying XML models. This ability to view and edit XML documents from within a standard Web browser is likely to prove a key empowering technology.
How To Read This Book
This book is targeted primarily at Web authors wishing to use XForms in their work. It is also meant to help IT specialists transition from using legacy HTML forms for their Web projects. The book has been written to complement the W3CX Forms specification, and not to replace it.
Each chapter of this book has a specific theme and concludes with a section that presents the material covered by that chapter at a glance. The book is organized in three parts:
Welcome: The first part gives a birds-eye view of XForms and the various XML standards that it uses. Components: The second part details the various components making up the XForms architecture. Emerging Areas: The final part covers the relevance of XForms in the areas of Web services, multimodal interaction and accessibility. Welcome To XForms
The first chapter of this book presents a birds-eye view of XForms after motivating the need for this new technology. This chapter should be sufficient to give decision makers a taste for the benefits of this exciting new standard. Web authors will find an introductory example that is first authored using the now familiar legacy HTML forms and then recast as an XForms application.
W3C XForms is built on a set of XML standards. The second chapter reviews these various standard building blocks and is meant as a quick tutorial. The material presented here is sufficient to get a taste for these standards and understand the examples in this book. However, it is not meant to be a complete review of these various standards. Readers familiar with XML Schema, XML namespaces and XPath will find this chapter a useful review. Readers new to these specifications will find the chapter a useful starting point as they get acquainted with the space of XML standards.
XForms Components
The next six chapters present the components making up XForms. Each chapter consists of numerous examples that illustrate each concept as it is introduced;the examples have been designed to build on one another and as a consequence, examples in each chapter increase in complexity. XForms authors will find the index at the end of the book useful when looking up the usage pattern for the various XForms constructs. Implementors should find this useful in testing their implementations against the various XForms features.
XForms And The Next Generation Web
The final part of the book focuses on three key areas where XForms is likely to play a significant role:
Web Services: Creating user interfaces to Web Services. Multimodal Interaction: Deploying multimodal interaction where users are able to interact using a variety of synchronized modalities such as spoken and visual interaction. This aspect is extremely relevant in deploying Web interaction to the plethora of emerging mobile devices. Accessibility: Ensuring that Web content and applications are accessible to all. Implementing accessibility assures Web authors of the widest possible audience for their content; it also ensures that Web content meets US Federal Access Guidelines. These areas are at the center of intense activity within the standards community and are the focus of emerging customer solutions from the various major vendors.These chapters are designed to give IT specialists a leg up in coming up tospeed on how the new XForms standard meshes with these three key areas of Webdevelopment.
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