XMLSpy® 2012provides comprehensive JSON editing support as well as JSON <=> XML conversion.

JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) is a light-weight, text-based language for data interchange. JSON is often used for serializing and transmitting structured data over a network connection and therefore is commonly used in AJAX and Web services applications. It was originally based on a subset of the JavaScript language, but is now considered programming language-independent, as parsers for JSON are readily available in multiple languages.

The JSON editor in XMLSpy allows you to view and edit JSON files using the same intuitive Text and Grid Views available for XML editing, with useful editing guides and entry helpers.

Altova XMLSpy® 2012includes a powerful XSLT editor with support for XSLT 1.0 and schema-aware XSLT 2.0.

The XMLSpy XSLT editor includes numerous tools that facilitate quick, error-free stylesheet development.

Though you can use the XSLT editor in XMLSpy’s Enhanced Grid View to view and edit your stylesheet code in a tabular format, most developers prefer to work Advanced Text View for this type of development. When you're editing XSLT, the Text View provides syntax coloring, line numbering, source folding, book marking, and other visual cues for organizing and navigating through your code quickly and easily.

XMLSpy Relational Database Integration

The XMLSpy® 2012relational database integration functionality overcomes interoperability challenges, allowing you to easily query database and convert back and forth between databases and XML files.

While most critical enterprise data is stored in relational databases today, XML has become the technology of choice for data exchange and content management. As a result, the importance of working with XML data in harmony with relational databases is paramount.

Relational Database Integration
To help software developers work with XML in conjunction with relational databases, XMLSpy interacts with the most popular relational databases in their native interface language, including:

 

 

Altova XMLSpy® 2012is the industry’s best selling XML editor with powerful support for working with all XML-based technologies.

When you need to create a new document in XMLSpy, you simply choose the type of file required, e.g., XSD, XSLT, XQuery, XBRL, etc. The XML editor helps make sure that you create a valid document by automatically starting the file with the proper inclusions, file extension, and entry helpers.

Whether you’re working with a new or existing document in the XML editor, you can take advantage of advanced text view (below) or one of XMLSpy’s graphical editing views. Both XML editing paradigms support the key features of an intelligent XML editor:

• XML Schema and DTD-based XML validation
• Multi-tabbed validation window for searching over multiple files
• Context-sensitive entry helpers
• Built-in XML document templates
• Powerful conversion utilities
• XML-aware find & replace and Find in Files window
• Intelligent XPath auto-completion
• XSLT / XQuery editors, debuggers, and profilers
• Database integration
• WSDL editor and SOAP client / debugger for Web services development
• XBRL support
• Support for OOXML in Microsoft Office 2007 and higher
• XML-aware file differencing
• Royalty-free program code generation
• Creation of charts for displaying XML data
• JSON editing and conversion
• Integration with Visual Studio® and Eclipse
• Java and COM APIs
• 32-bit and 64-bit versions
• And more

XMLSpy is an advanced XML editor for modeling, editing, transforming, and debugging XML-related technologies. The XML editor delivers the power you need to create the most advanced XML and Web applications, yet at the same time it’s flexible enough to allow you to work with any XML technology in a way that best suits the complexity of the document and your preferences, for instance, if you prefer to develop in a text view or graphical view, or switch back and forth between the two.

The XMLSpy XSLT editor has built-in knowledge of XSL, XSLT, and XHTML. It provides intelligent entry helper windows and drop down menus that offer you choices of elements, attributes, and entities that you can insert with one click, and code completion speeds typing and ensures balanced opening and closing tags.

XMLSpy® 2012includes native, schema-aware support for XQuery 1.0 in its XQuery editor, XQuery debugger, and XQuery profiler.

XQuery is an important new language for extracting information from XML documents and databases. Built largely on the robust XPath 2.0 specification, XQuery is predicted to be for XML what SQL is to the relational database. Altova XMLSpy provides powerful support for XQuery and XPath 2.0 in its XQuery editor, XQuery debugger and an XQuery profiler. Support for both standards has been updated to comply with the respective standards released by the W3C on January 23, 2007.

Altova XMLSpy® 2012includes the industry’s most standards-conformant XML validator and an informative XML validation window for locating, viewing, and troubleshooting errors.

Altova XMLSpy includes numerous features for helping you create valid XML documents quickly and easily. Intelligent XML editing features such as context-sensitive code completion and entry helper features offer you valid choices based on the content model and your location in a document, and the new, improved XML validation window offers detailed information about any XML validation errors in your document or project file.

XMLSpy supports validating any XML file based on its associated DTD or XML Schema. The multi-tabbed XML validation window provides granular details about each error, including:

• The reason for the error
• A link to the error in the working XML file
• A link to the corresponding definition(s) in the associated schema file
• Links to relevant information in the applicable specification on the W3C Web site

XMLSpy® 2012provides intelligent XPath auto-completion, the powerful XPath Analyzer window, and an XPath builder that assist in the building and verifying of XPath expressions, which are used in XSLT, XQuery, and XML Schema development.

XMLSpy® 2012supports XPath 1.0 and includes a complete implementation of the powerful new XPath 2.0 specification, which extends XPath significantly with the addition of powerful new functions, increased data processing capabilities, improved stability through strong data typing, and much more.

Intelligent XPath Auto-completion

As you’re composing an XPath expression in Text View, Grid View, or in the XPath Analyzer window, XMLSpy® 2012provides you with valid XPath functions, as well as element and attribute names from the associated schema and XML instance(s). Intelligent XPath auto-completion accounts for namespaces when listing options and even provides deep path suggestions when the required node is not in close proximity to the current context.

XMLSpy® 2012includes a powerful graphical XML Schema editor, with a visual design paradigm and intelligent entry helpers that help you model, edit, and document XML Schemas with ease.

Since the XML Schema editor in XMLSpy allows you to create schemas in a graphical manner, you can focus on the semantics of your schema while leaving the syntactical details of the XML Schema language to XMLSpy.

XML Schema Editor Design MenuPREMIUM Version
The Schema Design menu provides numerous choices for working with your schema in the XML Schema editor.

XML Schema Design - Identity Constraints
Configuring identity constraints (i.e., key/keyref/unique values) is an important aspect of XML Schema development, especially for database users. XMLSpy includes enhanced support for editing identity constraints with helpful visual cues and editing options.

DTDs and XML Schemas are important aspects of XML that define the logical structure (or content model) of an XML document. XMLSpy® 2012includes a powerful DTD editor that integrates DTD creation with the editing of XML instance documents. Supported Schemas

XMLSpy® 2012supports both editing and schema validation of Document Type Definitions (DTDs) and W3C XML Schemas (XSD) and can validate an XML instance document against either schema type.

DTD Editing and Validation

XMLSpy® 2012allows efficient editing of any schema type or DTD through its enhanced grid view, which is ideally suited for showing the structure of the content model. This lets you actually edit DTDs directly within the hierarchical representation.

Below is a snippet from a DTD in the XMLSpy® 2012DTD editor. Please note the easily recognizable tree structure that can be edited just like the hierarchical element structure of any regular XML document. In addition, attribute lists are shown using a database/table view representation, which is ideally suited for this structure.

XMLSpy® 2012and AltovaXML® 2010 support validation of XBRL to ensure accuracy and compliance of XBRL filings.

XMLSpy® 2012includes a new engine that supports validation of documents created based on XBRL 2.1 as well as XBRL Dimensions 1.0, which is an extension of XBRL. This allows you to view and analyze XBRL taxonomies and also to validate XBRL instance documents against taxonomies. XBRL linkbases can also be validated against their associated schema file. When viewing XBRL documents, you can choose between XMLSpy's Text View or Grid View (shown below), which provides a graphical, easy to navigate representation of the document's content.

Standard XML editors are not sufficient for working with XBRL because they cannot process the normalization and semantic properties that XBRL adds to the XML specification. The added XBRL functionality in XMLSpy makes it the only fully featured XML editor on the market with the capacity to understand the multiple relations and content validation that makes XBRL such a powerful language for explicit and transparent financial reporting.

XMLSpy® 2012Enterprise Edition includes a graphical XBRL taxonomy editor for visualizing, editing, extending, and documenting XBRL taxonomies.

The XMLSpy XBRL taxonomy editor uses the same editing paradigm as the popular graphical XML Schema editor, providing a graphical view of XBRL taxonomies and intelligent taxonomy editing features. By organizing different components on easy-to-filter tabs and providing informative icons, mouseover messages, detail windows, and context-sensitive entry helpers, the XMLSpy XBRL taxonomy editor makes it easy to both view and understand existing taxonomies, and create new ones by way of extending industry-standard taxonomies. It even includes the handy XBRL Taxonomy Wizard to give you a head start when extending or creating a new XBRL taxonomy.

XMLSpy provides powerful support for accessing, editing, transforming, and querying XML data saved in Microsoft® Office 2007 documents and other zipped files.

With the introduction of the Office Open XML formats in Microsoft Office 2007, the vast amount of business data stored in Office files such as Word documents, Excel spreadsheets, and PowerPoint presentations is now saved as XML. This is a huge advantage for both business users and application developers, because, though business users still work with information through the familiar Office user interface, all their data is now standards-based and highly interoperable.

Each Office 2007 document is stored in a zip archive that includes the user data in XML and other files with style information, images, etc. XMLSpy allows you to extract, edit, transform, and process the XML data stored in Office 2007 files (as well as any other zipped archive). These capabilities allow developers to work with the vast amount of data stored as XML in Word 2007, Excel 2007, and PowerPoint 2007 documents with full validation, intelligent entry helpers, and other useful features, and develop XSLT and XQuery transformations to publish the data or utilize it in other applications.

WSDL Editor and Documentation Generator

XMLSpy® 2012includes a graphical WSDL editor that makes it easy to create, edit, visualize, validate, and generate documentation for WSDL 1.1 and WSDL 2.0 files.

A WSDL (Web Services Description Language) definition acts as the initial Web services interface, providing clients with all the information they need to interact with the service in a standards-based way. By building this interface first, client and server programmers can implement their respective programming contract using any language or operating system, avoiding interoperability problems.

Despite the advantages of WSDL for facilitating simplified, standards-based communications, WSDL syntax can be complex, and writing the code by hand in a text-only editor is often difficult and confusing. XMLSpy’s unique graphical approach to WSDL design simplifies WSDL development by allowing you to build your WSDL visually, with drag-and-drop functionality and full validation and editing guidance.

A WSDL (Web Services Description Language) definition acts as the initial Web services interface, providing clients with all the information they need to interact with the service in a standards-based way. By building this interface first, client and server programmers can implement their respective programming contract using any language or operating system, avoiding interoperability problems.

Despite the advantages of WSDL for facilitating simplified, standards-based communications, WSDL syntax can be complex, and writing the code by hand in a text-only editor is often difficult and confusing. XMLSpy’s unique graphical approach to WSDL design simplifies WSDL development by allowing you to build your WSDL visually, with drag-and-drop functionality and full validation and editing guidance.

XML Schema Driven Code Generator

XMLSpy® 2012includes a built-in code generator that generates program code bindings of XML Schema components in Java, C++, or Microsoft C#.

What is an XML Data Binding?

An XML data binding is a mapping of one or more XML data elements to a set of related software objects. Implementation of a data binding for XML data elements is required because XML is not a full programming language, in that it cannot be compiled or executed as stand-alone binary executable file. Rather, XML documents must be bound to an external software application or runtime environment such as a business-to-business application or Web service.

An XML data binding allows you to programmatically work with XML documents from within your software application via a set of simple objects. It can be thought of as an abstraction layer between an XML document and your custom application (business logic), alleviating the need for developers to understand the technical intricacies of loading, editing, and saving, an XML document using low-level XML parsing APIs.

The following figure shows a typical example of the application of a data binding in a Web Services application, located in between the inbound XML stream and custom business logic: