XML Namespace
Encyclopedia
xmlns tagged XML namespaces are used for providing uniquely named elements and attributes in an XML
document. They are defined in a W3C recommendation
. An XML instance may contain element or attribute names from more than one XML vocabulary. If each vocabulary is given a namespace
, the ambiguity between identically named elements or attributes can be resolved.
A simple example would be to consider an XML instance that contained references to a customer and an ordered product. Both the customer element and the product element could have a child element named id. References to the id element would therefore be ambiguous; placing them in different namespaces would remove the ambiguity.
(URI). Typically, the URI chosen for the namespace of a given XML vocabulary describes a resource under the control of the author or organisation defining the vocabulary, such as a URL
for the author's Web server. However, the namespace specification does not require nor suggest that the namespace URI be used to retrieve information; it is simply treated by an XML parser as a string. For example, the document at http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml itself does not contain any code. It simply describes the XHTML
namespace to human readers. Using a URI (such as"http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" ) to identify a namespace, rather than a simple string (such as "xhtml"), reduces the possibility of different namespaces using duplicate identifiers.
Although the term namespace URI is widespread, the W3C Recommendation refers to it as the namespace name. The specification is not entirely prescriptive about the precise rules for namespace names (it does not explicitly say that parsers must reject documents where the namespace name is not a valid Uniform Resource Identifier
), and many XML parsers allow any character string to be used. In version 1.1 of the recommendation, the namespace name becomes an Internationalized Resource Identifier
, which licenses the use of non-ASCII characters that in practice were already accepted by nearly all XML software. The term namespace URI persists, however, not only in popular usage, but also in many other specifications from W3C and elsewhere.
Following publication of the Namespaces recommendation, there was an intensive debate about how a relative URI should be handled, with some intensely arguing that it should simply be treated as a character string, and others arguing with conviction that it should be turned into an absolute URI by resolving it against the base URI of the document. The result of the debate was a ruling from W3C that relative URIs were deprecated.
The use of URIs taking the form of URLs in the http scheme (such as http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml) is common, despite the absence of any formal relationship with the HTTP protocol. The Namespaces specification does not say what should happen, if such a URL is dereferenced (that is, if software attempts to retrieve a document from this location). One convention adopted by some users is to place a RDDL
document at the location. In general, however, users should assume that the namespace URI is simply a name, not the address of a document on the Web.
For example, the following declaration maps the "xhtml:" prefix to the XHTML namespace:
Any element or attribute whose name starts with the prefix "xhtml:" is considered to be in the XHTML namespace, if it or an ancestor has the above namespace declaration.
It is also possible to declare a default namespace. For example:
In this case, any element without a namespace prefix is considered to be in the XHTML namespace, if it or an ancestor has the above default namespace declaration.
Attributes are never subject to the default namespace. An attribute without an explicit namespace prefix is considered not to be in any namespace.
XML Namespaces 1.1 also introduces the option to undeclare other namespace prefixes. For example, if the attribute
Nearly all programming models allow the name of an element or attribute node to be retrieved as a three-part name: the local name, the namespace prefix, and the namespace URI. Applications should avoid attaching any significance to the choice of prefix, but the information is provided because it can be helpful to human readers. Names are considered equal, if the namespace URI and local name match.
In addition, most models provide some way of determining which namespaces have been declared for a given element. This information is needed because some XML vocabularies allow qualified names (containing namespace prefixes) to appear in the content of elements or attributes, as well as in their names. There are three main ways this information can be provided:
XML
Extensible Markup Language is a set of rules for encoding documents in machine-readable form. It is defined in the XML 1.0 Specification produced by the W3C, and several other related specifications, all gratis open standards....
document. They are defined in a W3C recommendation
W3C recommendation
A W3C Recommendation is the final stage of a ratification process of the World Wide Web Consortium working group concerning a technical standard. This designation signifies that a document has been subjected to a public and W3C-member organization's review. It aims to standardise the Web technology...
. An XML instance may contain element or attribute names from more than one XML vocabulary. If each vocabulary is given a namespace
Namespace (computer science)
A namespace is an abstract container or environment created to hold a logical grouping of unique identifiers or symbols . An identifier defined in a namespace is associated only with that namespace. The same identifier can be independently defined in multiple namespaces...
, the ambiguity between identically named elements or attributes can be resolved.
A simple example would be to consider an XML instance that contained references to a customer and an ordered product. Both the customer element and the product element could have a child element named id. References to the id element would therefore be ambiguous; placing them in different namespaces would remove the ambiguity.
Namespace names
A namespace name is a uniform resource identifierUniform Resource Identifier
In computing, a uniform resource identifier is a string of characters used to identify a name or a resource on the Internet. Such identification enables interaction with representations of the resource over a network using specific protocols...
(URI). Typically, the URI chosen for the namespace of a given XML vocabulary describes a resource under the control of the author or organisation defining the vocabulary, such as a URL
Uniform Resource Locator
In computing, a uniform resource locator or universal resource locator is a specific character string that constitutes a reference to an Internet resource....
for the author's Web server. However, the namespace specification does not require nor suggest that the namespace URI be used to retrieve information; it is simply treated by an XML parser as a string. For example, the document at http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml itself does not contain any code. It simply describes the XHTML
XHTML
XHTML is a family of XML markup languages that mirror or extend versions of the widely-used Hypertext Markup Language , the language in which web pages are written....
namespace to human readers. Using a URI (such as
Although the term namespace URI is widespread, the W3C Recommendation refers to it as the namespace name. The specification is not entirely prescriptive about the precise rules for namespace names (it does not explicitly say that parsers must reject documents where the namespace name is not a valid Uniform Resource Identifier
Uniform Resource Identifier
In computing, a uniform resource identifier is a string of characters used to identify a name or a resource on the Internet. Such identification enables interaction with representations of the resource over a network using specific protocols...
), and many XML parsers allow any character string to be used. In version 1.1 of the recommendation, the namespace name becomes an Internationalized Resource Identifier
Internationalized Resource Identifier
On the Internet, the Internationalized Resource Identifier is a generalization of the Uniform Resource Identifier . While URIs are limited to a subset of the ASCII character set, IRIs may contain characters from the Universal Character Set , including Chinese or Japanese kanji, Korean, Cyrillic...
, which licenses the use of non-ASCII characters that in practice were already accepted by nearly all XML software. The term namespace URI persists, however, not only in popular usage, but also in many other specifications from W3C and elsewhere.
Following publication of the Namespaces recommendation, there was an intensive debate about how a relative URI should be handled, with some intensely arguing that it should simply be treated as a character string, and others arguing with conviction that it should be turned into an absolute URI by resolving it against the base URI of the document. The result of the debate was a ruling from W3C that relative URIs were deprecated.
The use of URIs taking the form of URLs in the http scheme (such as http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml) is common, despite the absence of any formal relationship with the HTTP protocol. The Namespaces specification does not say what should happen, if such a URL is dereferenced (that is, if software attempts to retrieve a document from this location). One convention adopted by some users is to place a RDDL
RDDL
In computing, Resource Directory Description Language is an extension of XHTML Basic 1.0. An RDDL document, called a Resource Directory, provides a package of information about some target. The targets which RDDL was designed to describe are XML namespaces...
document at the location. In general, however, users should assume that the namespace URI is simply a name, not the address of a document on the Web.
Namespace declaration
An XML namespace is declared using the reserved XML pseudo-attributexmlns or xmlns:prefix, the value of which must be a valid namespace name.For example, the following declaration maps the "xhtml:" prefix to the XHTML namespace:
xmlns:xhtml="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"
Any element or attribute whose name starts with the prefix "xhtml:" is considered to be in the XHTML namespace, if it or an ancestor has the above namespace declaration.
It is also possible to declare a default namespace. For example:
xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"
In this case, any element without a namespace prefix is considered to be in the XHTML namespace, if it or an ancestor has the above default namespace declaration.
Attributes are never subject to the default namespace. An attribute without an explicit namespace prefix is considered not to be in any namespace.
Namespace undeclaration
When an element carries the attributexmlns="", the default namespace for that element and its descendants reverts to "no namespace": that is, unprefixed names are considered not to be in any namespace.XML Namespaces 1.1 also introduces the option to undeclare other namespace prefixes. For example, if the attribute
xmlns:p="" appears on an element, the namespace prefix p is no longer in scope (and therefore cannot be used) on that element or on its descendants, unless reintroduced by another namespace declaration.Namespaces in APIs and XML object models
Different specifications have taken different approaches on how namespace information is presented to applications.Nearly all programming models allow the name of an element or attribute node to be retrieved as a three-part name: the local name, the namespace prefix, and the namespace URI. Applications should avoid attaching any significance to the choice of prefix, but the information is provided because it can be helpful to human readers. Names are considered equal, if the namespace URI and local name match.
In addition, most models provide some way of determining which namespaces have been declared for a given element. This information is needed because some XML vocabularies allow qualified names (containing namespace prefixes) to appear in the content of elements or attributes, as well as in their names. There are three main ways this information can be provided:
- As attribute nodes named "xmlns" or "xmlns:xxx", exactly as the namespaces are written in the source XML document. This is the model presented by DOMDocument Object ModelThe Document Object Model is a cross-platform and language-independent convention for representing and interacting with objects in HTML, XHTML and XML documents. Aspects of the DOM may be addressed and manipulated within the syntax of the programming language in use...
.
- As namespace declarations: distinguished from attributes, but corresponding one-to-one with the relevant attributes in the source XML document. This is the model presented by JDOMJDOMJDOM is an open source Java-based document object model for XML that was designed specifically for the Java platform so that it can take advantage of its language features. JDOM integrates with Document Object Model and Simple API for XML , supports XPath and XSLT. It uses external parsers to...
.
- As in-scope namespace bindings: in this model, the application is able to determine which namespaces are in scope for any given element, but is not able to determine which elements contain the actual declarations. This is the model used in XPathXPathXPath is a language for selecting nodes from an XML document. In addition, XPath may be used to compute values from the content of an XML document...
, XSLTXSLTXSLT is a declarative, XML-based language used for the transformation of XML documents. The original document is not changed; rather, a new document is created based on the content of an existing one. The new document may be serialized by the processor in standard XML syntax or in another format,...
, and XQueryXQuery- Features :XQuery provides the means to extract and manipulate data from XML documents or any data source that can be viewed as XML, such as relational databases or office documents....
.