XML was designed to describe data and to focus on what data is.

HTML was designed to display data and to focus on how data looks.

Before you continue you should have a basic understanding of the following :

• HTML / XHTML
• JavaScript or VBScript

If you want to study these subjects first, find the tutorials on our related pages.

• XML stands for EXtensible Markup Language
• XML is a markup language much like HTML
• XML was designed to describe data
• XML tags are not predefined. You must define your own tags
• XML uses a Document Type Definition (DTD) or an XML Schema to describe the data
• XML with a DTD or XML Schema is designed to be self-descriptive
• XML is a W3C Recommendation