XML Schema Complete Reference, The

5.1. XML Documents

XML documents as defined in the XML Recommendation as strings of characters, but the markup within them implies a rich structure. This structure is implied in that recommendation and defined more carefully in the Infoset Recommendation. The latter Recommendation was written after the Namespace Recommendation, so it is “namespace aware”: The data structures it defines are designed to make namespace information directly available as properties of objects.

Notation Note

The XML Recommendation uses the term “document” solely to mean the concrete document; The Infoset Recommendation uses the terms “infoset” and “document information item” to mean the abstract document. When dealing with schemas, it is often immaterial whether the ...