Programming Jabber

XML Streams

By now, you should already know that Jabber relies heavily on XML. XML courses through Jabber’s veins; data sent and received between entities, and internally within the server itself, is formatted in XML packets.

However, the XML philosophy goes further than this. A connection between two Jabber endpoints, say, a client and a server, is made via a TCP socket, and XML is transferred between these endpoints. However, it’s not just random fragments of XML flowing back and forth. There is a structure, a choreography, imposed upon that flow. The entire conversation that takes place between these two endpoints is embodied in a pair of XML documents.