Effective XML: 50 Specific Ways to Improve Your XML

Where to Stop?

At the absolute extreme I've seen it suggested (facetiously) that an integer such as 6587 should be written like this:

<integer>
  <thousands>6</thousands>
  <hundreds>5</hundreds>
  <tens>8</tens>
  <ones>7</ones>
</integer>

Obviously, this is going too far. It would be far more troublesome to process than a simple, unmarked-up number. After all, almost everyone who wants to use a number treats it as an atomic quantity rather than a composition of single digits. However, this does suggest a good rule of thumb for where to stop inserting tags. Anything that will normally be treated as a single atomic value should not be further divided by markup. However, if a value is composed of smaller parts that will need to be addressed individually, ...