13.0 Introduction

Every once in a while, a seemingly simple concept turns into a revolutionary idea. When you take a step back and look at it, you feel like hitting yourself for not thinking of it first. In its simplest form, the Extensible Markup Language (XML) is just a text file following a specific format consisting of tagged elements and their associated attributes. However, it is this flexible file format that allows efficient hierarchical data organization and has lead to its wide adoption in everything from configuration files to database implementation.

In this chapter, you'll see how to use the .NET Framework to create, parse, analyze, and manipulate XML documents. Because XML is used in several areas within the framework, this chapter is really just a stepping-stone to help you become familiar with XML before applying that knowledge to other areas within .NET. As soon as you become proficient in reading, writing, and manipulating XML programmatically, you'll have the necessary toolset available to utilize, enhance, and extend several key technologies later.