Are the elements of an XML alwas ordered if I get them from SQL Server 2012

Question

I found

"Order of Attributes" The order of attributes in an XML instance is not preserved. When you query the XML instance stored in the xml type column, the order of attributes in the resulting XML may be different from the original XML instance."

from a link https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb510442.aspx

Q1) does that mean elements like following will not have any order that means I may get xyz1 then xyz. Or it will be ordered?

xyz
xyz1

Answer 1

As stated in https://www.w3.org/TR/xml-infoset/#infoitem.document order of elements is part of XML infoset. All libraries should preserve order. Notice that:

[children] An ordered list of child information items, in document order.

and

[attributes] An unordered set of attribute information items ...

Ordered list <> unordered set.

Answer 2

XML elements are ordered; XML attributes are not. So, for this XML,

<root>
  <element1 attribute1="value1" attribute2="value2">element1 value</element>
  <element2 attribute3="value3" attribute4="value4">element2 value</element>
</root>

the elements, element1 and element2 have significant ordering, and attributes attribute1 through attribute4 have insignificant ordering.

See also XML attribute vs XML element.