Web Technology - Old Questions
11. How attributes and elements are defined in a DTD? Illustrate with an example.
DTD stands for Document Type Definition. It defines the legal building blocks of an XML document. It is used to define document structure with a list of legal elements and attributes. Its main purpose is to define the structure of an XML document. It contains a list of legal elements and define the structure with the help of them.
Elements in DTD
In a DTD, elements are declared with an ELEMENT declaration. In DTD, XML elements are declared with the following syntax:
<!ELEMENT element-name category>
or
<!ELEMENT element-name (element-content)>
E.g.
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<!DOCTYPE note [
<!ELEMENT note (to,from,heading,body)>
<!ELEMENT to (#PCDATA)>
<!ELEMENT from (#PCDATA)>
<!ELEMENT heading (#PCDATA)>
<!ELEMENT body (#PCDATA)>
]>
<note>
<to>Tove</to>
<from>Jani</from>
<heading>Reminder</heading>
<body>Don't forget me this weekend</body>
</note>
Attributes in DTD
In a DTD, attributes are declared with an ATTLIST declaration. An attribute declaration has the following syntax:
<!ATTLIST element-name attribute-name attribute-type attribute-value>
E.g.
DTD example:
<!ATTLIST employee id CDATA #REQUIRED>
XML example:
<employee id="001" />