Course 1905—Five days—Instructor-led

Building XML-Based Web Applications

Introduction

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At Course Completion

• List the uses and benefits of XML on a Web site.
• Create well-formed and valid XML documents.
• Create an XML schema.
• Use XSL to display XML data in a Web browser.
• Use XSL to transform XML data into a different format.
• Display dynamic XML data in a Web browser by using data binding and the Document Object Model.
• Use ASP and ADO to read data from a data source and store it as XML.
• Add, delete, and update data on the client by using XML and saving data to a database on the server.

Microsoft Certified Professional Exams

• There is no Microsoft Certified Professional exam associated with this course.

Prerequisites

• Knowledge of HTML
• Knowledge of relational databases
• Programming using Microsoft Visual Basic^®, Visual Basic for Applications, or the Visual Basic, Scripting Edition (VBScript) language: creating procedures, using loops, variables, and COM objects
• Knowledge of a data-access API such as DAO, RDO, or ADO

• Course 1013, Mastering Microsoft Visual Basic 6 Development
• Course 1017, Mastering Web Application Development Using Microsoft Visual InterDev 6

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Course Materials and Software

You will be provided with the following software for use in the classroom:

• Microsoft Windows^® 2000 Server
• Microsoft SQL Server™ 7.0
• Microsoft Visual InterDev^® 6.0
• Microsoft Internet Explorer 5
• Course Files
  • Labs
  • Practices
  • Demonstrations

Course Outline

Day 1

Module 1: Overview of XML Documents

Topics

Skills

• List the uses for XML on a Web site.
• List the advantages and disadvantages of using XML.
• Describe the structure of an XML document.
• Create a simple XML document.
• List some of the issues associated with designing XML documents.

Module 2: Overview of XML Technologies

Topics

Skills

• Explain the use of style sheets.
• Explain the use of data binding XML data to HTML.
• Describe the Document Object Model (DOM).
• Explain the need for validation.
• Describe the differences between DTDs and XML schemas.

Day 2

Module 3: Generating XML Data from a Database

Topics

Labs

Skills

• Describe how Active Server Pages interact with a Web client.
• Process form data with server-side scripting and the Response object.
• Use the Response object to return data to the client.
• Create an ASP page to return XML to a browser.
• Use an ActiveX Data Object (ADO) Recordset to retrieve data from a database.
• Convert the contents of an ADO Recordset into XML.

Module 4: Displaying an XML Document Using XSL

Topics

Lab

Skills

• Describe how XSL transforms an XML tree into a different XML result tree.
• Write an XSL style sheet with template rules and <xsl:value-of> actions.
• Use <xsl:apply templates> to apply additional templates.
• Use the path and filter capabilities of XSL for pattern matching.
• Achieve complex styling with XSL language constructs.
• Generate new nodes in the XML result tree.

Day 3

Module 5: Embedding XML Data in HTML

Topics

Lab

Skills

• Describe the nature of a data island.
• Describe how to use Data Source Objects to display XML data islands in an HTML page.
• Create an XML data island in an HTML file.
• Bind XML data to HTML elements.

Module 6: Manipulating XML Data on the Client Using DOM

Topics

Labs

Skills

• List four XML DOM objects.
• Identify the nodes of a DOM tree.
• Retrieve information from a DOM tree.
• Add, move, and remove nodes in a DOM tree.
• Identify the limitations of XSL style sheet transformations.
• Use DOM to perform a transformation between XML and HTML.

Day 4

Module 7: Posting XML Data from Client to Server

Topics

Labs

Skills

• Describe the issues involved in creating an XML data packet to send to a server.
• Use the XMLHTTP object to send data back to the server.
• Convert XML into a server-side DOM tree.
• Update the back-end database with data from the client.
• Issue a response from the server to the client.

Module 8: Validating XML Data Using Schemas

Topics

Lab

Skills

• Describe when validation is needed.
• Create an XML schema.
• Validate an XML document by using an XML schema.
• Apply an XML schema to an XML document, both statically and dynamically.

Day 5

Module 9: Introducing BizTalk^™

Topics

Skills

• Identify problems inherent in sharing disparate data.
• Identify the business-to-business uses of XML.
• Describe the purpose of Microsoft BizTalk Framework.
• List the resources available in the Microsoft BizTalk Jumpstart Kit.

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