Resources

• Read Part 1 (March 2005) and Part 3 (August 2005) of this three-part developerWorks tutorial series on preparing for the IBM XML certification exam.
  
  
• Find out more about the IBM Certified Developer in XML and Related Technologies exam. This page includes:
  • Details on the job role and target audience for whom the certification was built
  • Recommended prerequisites for the knowledge and skills that one should possess before considering this certification
  • The test objectives and the skills measured by the exam
  • Recommended educational resources to prepare you for the test, based on the test objectives
  • A pre-assessment/sample test to gauge your readiness for the actual exam
  
  
• Check out this introductory article on XML certification by Pradeep Chopra, co-author of this tutorial (developerWorks, March 2003).
  
  
• Practice and assess your knowledge level using the Whizlabs XML Exam Simulator.
  
  
• Refer to the relevant specifications for more information about the various technologies covered in this tutorial:
  • XML Path Language (XPath), Version 1.0
  • Extensible Stylesheet Language Family (XSL), including XSL-FO
  • XML Linking Language (XLink), Version 1.0
  • XPointer -- Framework, element() Scheme, and xmlns() Scheme
  • Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), Level 2
  • Document Object Model (DOM)
  • Simple API for XML (SAX)
  
  
• Confused by all the XML standards out there? Uche Ogbuji's developerWorks article series on XML standards can help you sort through it all:
  • Part 1 -- The core standards (January 2004)
  • Part 2 -- XML processing standards (February 2004)
  • Part 3 -- The most important vocabularies (February 2004)
  • Part 4 -- Detailed cross-reference of the most important XML standards (March 2004)
  
  
• Visit the Worldwide Web Consortium (W3C) site, which contains the specifications for XML and many of its related technologies. This is probably the best place to get in-depth information on XML.
  
  
• Check out the developerWorks XML zone for a wide range of articles, tutorials, columns, forums, and other resources that cover extensible technologies in detail. While you're there, take a look at the developerWorks SOA and Web services zone for more on those topics.
  
  
• Start with the basics. Read Doug Tidwell's popular "Introduction to XML" tutorial here on developerWorks (August 2002).
  
  
• Read Bertrand Portier's developerWorks tutorial "Get started with XPath" (May 2004).
  
  
• Read Michael Kay's updated developerWorks article "What kind of language is XSLT?" (April 2005).
  
  
• Two developerWorks tutorials take an introductory look at XSLT, Nicholas Chase's "Create multi-purpose Web content with XSLT" (March 2003) and Leigh Dodds' "Code generation using XSLT" (April 2003).
  
  
• Check out Brett McLaughlin's developerWorks tips "How to use XLink with XML" (February 2002) and "Using XML and XPointer" (March 2002).
  
  
• For more on CSS, read Uche Ogbuji's developerWorks tutorials:
  • "Use Cascading Stylesheets to display XML" (November 2004)
  • "Use Cascading Stylesheets to display XML, Part 2" (February 2005)
  • "Use Cascading Stylesheets to display XML, Part 3" (June 2005)
  
  
• Let IBM's Doug Tidwell show you the ropes of XSL-FO:
  • XSL-FO basics tutorial (February 2003)
  • XSL-FO advanced techniques tutorial (February 2003)
  • HTML-to-FO conversion guide (February 2003)
  
  
• Learn more about DOM and SAX with Nicholas Chase's popular tutorials "Understanding DOM" (July 2003) and "Understanding SAX" (July 2003).
  
  
• Visit www.w3schools.org for good tutorials about various XML technologies.
  
  
• Try www.zvon.org, another good site that offers tutorials on these technologies.
  
  
• Visit PerfectXML for some good tips on XSLT.
  
  
• Check out the XML Certification forum at JavaRanch.
  
  
• You will need formatter software for displaying XSL-FO stylesheets. Get Formatting Objects Processor (FOP), an open source tool from Apache that you can use to display the output of the XSL-FO as PDF documents.
  
  
• Read Professional XML, 2nd Edition , the prescribed book for the XML Certification Exam that covers these technologies to the extent required by the exam.
  
  
• Also pick up the XML Bible by Elliotte Rusty Harold. This is a good book to get you started on XML technologies.
  
  
• Essential XML Quick Reference covers all the relevant topics except security and XSL-FO.
  
  
• Get Processing XML with Java , a very good book for understanding SAX and DOM. A free online edition of this book is available at http://www.cafeconleche.org/books/xmljava/.
  
  

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Table of contents

• Before you start
• XPath
• XSLT, XLink, and XPointer
• CSS and XSL-FO
• DOM
• SAX
• Wrap up
• Resources
• About the authors

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