Summary

Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) were originally created for use with HTML, but they also work quite well with XML. CSS focuses purely on the positioning and formatting of XML content and doesn't involve itself with processing or otherwise translating XML code. However, when it comes to positioning and formatting XML content for display within web pages, CSS proves to be a powerful and easy-to-use technology. CSS gives you the ability to carefully control the positioning of XML content on a page and align it as desired. Once you've positioned XML content on a page, you have the option of formatting the text using a variety of different CSS style properties. Through these style properties, you can control the font, color, background, and spacing of text, which gives you considerable flexibility in determining the appearance of text.

This hour introduced you to CSS and how it is used to style XML documents. You got started by learning the basics of CSS, including the fundamental layout and formatting styles that are used to style XML content. You then learned how to associate an external style sheet with an XML document, which is a necessity if you plan on seeing the fruits of your CSS labors. You also found out the difference between relative and absolute positioning and how each are used to position elements. You learned about several other CSS positioning features such as z-index, margins, padding, content alignment, fonts, colors, backgrounds, and text spacing. And finally, you wrapped up the hour by exploring a complete CSS example that pulled together most of what you learned throughout the lesson.