Word, the Internet, and XML

Web Page Development: Word's Strengths and Weaknesses

Word 2003 is a viable choice for the nonprofessional Web designer who may be already familiar with Word and reluctant to learn a new application. Using Word, even people with no HTML programming language experience can create basic Web pages with ease, including popular features such as scrolling text, frames, and cascading style sheets. However, Word lacks some of the high-end Web design features of an application like Microsoft FrontPage 2003 or Macromedia Dreamweaver MX, so someone who does Web design for a living would likely not choose Word for that work.

Word makes Web design easy by shielding the user from the raw coding, instead allowing the user to work in a familiar WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) environment in which formatting can be applied with toolbar buttons and menu commands. Then when the document is saved, Word converts all that formatting to HTML coding that Web browser applications can understand.

Web Technologies Supported in Word

Word 2003 is similar to Word 2002 in its Web design features. Word supports all the basic HTML codes that you would expect for formatting, plus several other technologies and scripting languages and supplementing traditional HTML code.

Word supports all these types of Web content:

• HTML. Hypertext Markup Language is the lingua franca (medium of exchange) of the World Wide Web. Almost every Web page is built with this language. HTML, a simple formatting and organizational language, is ideal for the display of text, simple graphics, and hyperlinks. It doesn't do anything fancy like search a database or pop up dialog boxes. The appeal of HTML lies in its ease of use and universal acceptance.

• CSS. Cascading style sheets are used to define the layout of a document precisely. Style sheets are more powerful than the styles found in Word because style sheets can also specify page layout. A style sheet can be a separate document, or it can be embedded in each HTML page. Because browsers have different capabilities in how they interpret these styles, they interpret what they can and ignore the rest; that is, they cascade down in their interpretation and display what they are able to.

• XML. EXtensible Markup Language is more robust and extensible (hence its name) than HTML. You can define new tags and their uses at any time and in any way by referencing them in an associated text document. The strength of XML is its capability to use these new tags to identify specific information. This technology vastly improves the users' abilities to find specific-subject Web pages and opens the Internet up to even more data mining. Chapter 25 deals with XML in detail.

• VML. Vector Markup Language uses text to define geometric shapes, colors, line widths, and so forth. These words are then interpreted and displayed as graphical images in browsers that understand VML (Microsoft Internet Explorer 5 and higher). No matter what size circle you want to display, you use the same amount of text to define it. VML reduces the bandwidth required to send a graphical image from a Web server to a browser. This improves the browser page load time, improves image quality, and helps reduce Internet or intranet network congestion.

• JavaScript and VBScript. Both of these script-style programming languages are in common everyday use on the Web right now. These languages handle simple programming tasks without having to load a separate application. JavaScript is supported by the vast majority of browsers; VBScript is supported by only Microsoft Internet Explorer browsers. These languages enable you to program interactivity into Web pages.

Word Features Lost When Saving in Web Format

Some weaknesses in Word's capability to translate all its features to Web pages still exist, even with the latest improvements. Here are a few Word features that do not transfer when you save in any of the Web Page formats

• Versioning

• Passwords

• Word file headers/footers

• Newspaper-style column flow (though the text is unaffected

Creating and Saving a Web Page in Word In Word 2003, creating a Web page is much the same as creating a Word document. You do not need to open up a special environment or think differently about the contents of your page.

Previewing a Web Page

As you are building your Web page, you can view or preview your Web pages using Web Layout view and Web Page Preview.

Web Layout view (choose View, Web Layout from the menu or click the Web Layout View icon in the status bar) presents your document like a Web page.

Web Page Preview enables you to preview your Web page in a browser without first having to save the file. Click File, Web Page Preview on the menu to initiate the process. The file in Word is opened in your default browser for viewing. This ensures that what you are building in Word is indeed being displayed the same way in the browser.

An Overview of XML

A lot of attention has been given to the extensive support for XML that has been added throughout Microsoft Office and Microsoft Word. In this chapter we will discuss what XML is and what Word's support of XML can do for you.

Scenarios and Applications for Using XML in Word

Before diving off into the mechanics of how Word supports XML integration, let's review some of the reasons why this might be useful:

• Preparing content that can easily be repurposed in new ways— If there were a way in today's business environment to calculate the cost of reentering and reprocessing information, it would be mind-boggling. If the data can be created originally in a structure that is consistent and can be queried for analysis, then the cost of using the data in new ways can be significantly reduced. Word provides this capability by allowing these original documents (trip reports, product orders, expense reports, and so forth) to be integrated with an XML schema.

• Working with other productivity applications that recognize XML— How many times have you tried to use a particular document type on a computer only to find out that the application needed was not installed, or that the right converter was not available to let you use it? The nature of XML structured documents is such that the content of the document can be modified without affecting the underlying structure needed by the specific application. Word provides this capability by allowing these XML files from other applications to be opened and edited while maintaining the original XML structure.

• Generating data for business applications and processes— As more critical business applications and processes become dependent on XML, the capability to generate data directly to support them becomes essential. Word provides this capability through XML Solutions by supporting one or many XSLT transformations to be integrated with the XML schema.

• Using programmed "Smart Documents"— Smart Documents are documents that include integrated programming to help you while you are using them. Existing templates in Word can have Smart Document programming added to them so that they become "process aware" and know at any given time what stage of the process they are in. This programming can include database access to store or retrieve information if needed. Smart Documents are implemented through XML Expansion Packs in Word.

Working with XML Schemas The full power of XML stems from combining the flexibility to create tags using whatever names you want and in whatever structure you want with enforcing strict compliance to that structure. The rules that are used to enforce this strict compliance are called XML schemas. Word provides you with the ability to manage the schemas you have available and to control which schemas are enforced for a given document. Understanding XML Schemas An XML schema is an abstract description of the structure you expect to use in an XML file. In the schema file (normally named with an extension of .xsd), you will find things such as these: Namespace definition Object/tag types (element, complex type, attribute, and so on) Object/tag names Data types (string, date, and so on) Object/tag relationships (hierarchy, min and max occurrences, and so on)

Saving to XML

Word provides multiple options for saving XML files so that users have the flexibility to meet their business needs. XML files can be saved using the Microsoft Word document schema, WordML, XML data only based on the schema(s) attached to the document, or data only using a transformation.

Saving an XML Document Using WordML

To save an XML document that preserves all the Word document properties and settings, follow these steps

1. Choose File, Save As.

2. In the Save As dialog box, select XML Document in the Save as Type list.

3. Enter a filename in the File Name text box.

4. Clear the Save Data Only check box if it is checked.

5. Click Save.