Howdy,
I just had a small explosion in my brain, and now i'm a little more confused
than I was before. I'm fairly new to XML, but understand it for the most
part in regards to formatting. I have some XML files I use for populating
dropdowns, like a statelist and other options. These are setup in the XML
file with attributes.
<root>
<state name=Massachusetts abb=MA/>
</root>
I also have XML files which I read and write to, using Elements and an XSD
for the dataset.
<root>
<article>
<title>Here</title>
<date>5/14/07</date>
<body>Hi there</body>
</article>
</root>
I know elements are treated as a separate entity, if i may use that word,
from the parent node. And I understand that data controls like a
dropdownlist looks for the properties/attributes as specified in its
properties so the attributes of XML is preferred and easy to use. What
doesn't make sense is that a Dataset will read from either and write back in
that same format it read from, now the issue is when a XML file is empty,
and a dataset writes to it, it defaults to elements instead of attributes,
which then causes a few issues until I create the XSL file, which then my
issues are gone. And from there it's OK and will work forever.
So, I guess I'm stating this more out of frustration with hopes of a little
clarity if I missed something. It's a lessoned learned, if I deal with XML
data in attributes i'm fine, and if I start with elements I should expect to
build a XSD and an XSL file.
David
