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On Jun 12, 2006, at 13:55, Costello, Roger L. wrote:
> Henri Sivonen said that if I take this simple XML:
>
> <?xml version="1.0"?>
>
> <root>
>
> Blah
>
> </root>
>
> and put it into Word, then the media type (MIME) is:
>
> application/msword
That's because the outer wrapper is then a Word file. It isn't
something you can feed to XML parser.
Of course, I am assuming that you are saving as .doc. If you save as
plain text, the same consideration apply as for Notepad.
> Conversely, if I put the same XML into Notepad, then the media type
> (MIME) is:
>
> application/xml
>
> Why is that?
In that case, there is no editor-specific wrapper format, so the
result is suitable for feeding to an XML parser. However, I also said
that text/plain is appropriate if you don't intend the file to be
processed as XML but want it processed as plain text (perhaps for the
purpose of discussing XML).
> Why is it that if I put XML into one editor (Word) I get a media
> type that is specific to the editor, whereas if I put XML into
> another editor (Notepad) then I get a media type that is
> independent of the editor?
Because one editor applies an editor-specific wrapper format and the
other does not.
> Suppose that I put the XML into Wordpad, what is the media type?
Depends on how you save.
> What are the general rules for determining the media type of XML?
If the data object is suitable for feeding to an XML parser, the type
is application/xml or a more specific type. A more specific type such
as application/xhtml+xml or application/atom+xml is appropriate if
the document is suitable for processing by a specialized UA (in this
case for XHTML and Atom respectively).
--
Henri Sivonen
hsivonen@iki.fi
http://hsivonen.iki.fi/
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