XML Tutorials - Herong's Tutorial Examples - v5.25, by Herong Yang
Complex Element Types
This section describes complex element types declared by 'complexType' statements. A complex element type defines an element that has at least one child element or at least one attribute.
Complex XML Element Type: An XML element that has at least one child element or at least one attribute. Complex XML elements must be defined with complex data types, which are defined by "complexType" statements:
<xsd:element name="element_name" type="my_type_name"/> <xsd:complexType name="my_data_type"> <xsd:sequence> <xsd:element name="child_element_1" type="data_type_1"/> <xsd:element name="child_element_2" type="data_type_2"/> ... </xsd:sequence> <xsd:attribute name="attribute_a" type="data_type_a"/> <xsd:attribute name="attribute_b" type="data_type_b"/> ... </xsd:complexType>
where "attribute" statement is used to define an attribute, and "sequence" statement is used to define the group of child elements and the order the child elements should appear in the XML structure.
Note that "attribute" statements must appear after the child element definition statements.
Additional options are available for the "element" statement enclosed in the "sequence" statement:
<xsd:sequence> <xsd:element name="child_element" type="data_type" minOccurs="0|1|...|unbounded" maxOccurs="0|1|...|unbounded" mixed="true|false"/> </xsd:sequence>
where:
There is one additional options available for the "attribute" statement:
<xsd:attribute name="attribute" type="data_type" use="optional|required"/>
where:
"sequence" is not the only way to group child elements. XSD provides 3 ways of grouping child element:
Of course, grouping statements can be nested.
Table of Contents
Introduction of XML (eXtensible Markup Language)
DOM (Document Object Model) Programming Interface
SAX (Simple API for XML) Programming Interface
DTD (Document Type Definition) Introduction
Validating an XML Document against the Specified DTD Document Type
XSD (XML Schema Definition) Introduction
"schema" - The Schema Declaration Statement
"element" - The Element Declaration Statement
Simple Element Types with Built-in Data Types
Simple Element Types with Extended Data Types
Anonymous or Inline Data Types
dictionary.xsd - A Sample XSD XML Schema File
Validating XML Documents Against Specified XML Schemas
XSL (Extensible Stylesheet Language) Introduction
XSLT (XSL Transformations) Introduction
XSLT Elements as Programming Statements
Control and Generate XML Element in the Result
PHP Extensions for XML Manipulation
Processing XML with Python Scripts
XML Tools Plugin for Notepad++
XML Plugin Packages for Atom Editor