With the boom in data creation, there is a business need to integrate from multiple heterogeneous sources. In traditional architecture, this would have been accomplished by developing a custom solution for each data source. As the number of sources increase, so does the complexity and cost. This is where eXtensible Markup Language (XML) comes into play.

The Best Thing Ever

Welcome to the world of a standardized exchange of information between disparate sources of data. Whether you are deploying service-oriented architecture (SOA), cloud computing, or dynamic data warehousing; XML will play a major role in the integration. XML-based solutions offer flexibility in build and adaptation for just about any use case. But what is it exactly and how does it work?

<car>

     <make> Tesla </make>
 
     <model>Model S</model>

     <description>

     I really really really really want this car

     </description>

     <colour>Red</colour>

</car>

XML is a markup language that was designed to store and transport data between systems, meant to be readable by both humans and machine. Because of its neutral structure using opening ( < > ) and closing ( </> ) tags, it is utilized among a variety of devices, applications, and vendors. This allows for the transport of structured, semi-structured, and unstructured data points. 

Existing industry standards such as FPML, IFX [in the financial industry] and HL7 v3 [in the healthcare industry] are all based upon XML. It is no surprise then that the popular use cases for XML in business transactions includes, but not limited to, sharing information via interfaces, storage and interpretation of data adaptable to multiple mediums, security with digital signatures, and the speed of content delivery.

Organizational Integration

Large enterprise organizations continuously look to re-engineer systems to provide ease of data flow and a better overall customer experience. Think of Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), and Electronic Health Record (EHR) systems being brought together with a multitude of applications and systems from multiple vendors coordinating as a single unit. The glue among all these individual units is XML, pulling transactional histories and displaying them using browsers, databases, processes, and workflows. 

Okay, but why is this so special?

XML itself as a core technology (not programming language as many assume) does not change; what has changed is how incorporated and utilized it has become.

It has become such a common medium of data transfer and retrieval that it can exchange across hardware, software, operating systems, and the beautiful abyss that is the Internet with web-based technologies. It also prevents having two applications re-architectured in order for them to integrate, because instead they can rely on a common data transfer format. XML was developed with the foresight to allow extensions to be built upon it, unlike some other technologies (looking at you Microsoft ASP). In the end XML is simple and easy to use, it allows for data to be easily separated and displayed.

ex. <you are> Awesome </you are>