If you’re wondering what an XML or API means, you’re not alone. A lot of website owners looking to improve their online presence and traffic are learning just how important these two things can be.
What XML Means
XML stands for Extensible Markup Language. How Stuff Works refers to it as the programming language that online applications use to communicate. With XML, developers can go beyond the usual web page building tasks. It essentially allows developers to set standards that govern what information appears in a document and how it behaves. Since it allows users to define the content without affecting the formatting, it makes it easy for users to recycle the content, ideally customizing it for other applications. And because it uses notepad or simple file formats, it’s quite easy to share formats as well as parsing tools that suit those formats from different interfaces as well as data structures.
Meaning of API
Means Application Programming Interface, API makes it possible for a software application, for instance, to communicate with a remote application over the internet. It essentially sets the rules how two entities or applications communicate. APIs, in turn, are managed by web services, one of which is XML.
Putting Them Together
When you use XML API together, you end up with Simple API in XML, also known as SAX. It’s freely available for those who need a generic API for parsers.
Finding Help
With the ease that XML brings, developers all over the world who are used to different computing environments rely on XML a great deal. Applications that work on XML also incur the lowest cost. But before you can make these applications work to your benefit, you’d have to hire someone who can build and manage them in the first place. Don’t want to hire in-house? Look for companies offering cloud-based solutions for web applications.
