Is processing of "attribute" different from "element"

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XML attribute vs XML element

I was informed to use attributes for metadata and elements for data. I was wondering what are the benefits of separating elements from attributes. Are attributes processed differently than the elements in XML?

Thanks, Mohmd.

How they are processed depends entirely on how you define them? There is no rule on how to process an xml but its definition (xsd). — Jacob, Aug 08 '11 at 11:10

score -1 · Answer 1 · edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

-1

Some of the problems with attributes are:

attributes cannot contain multiple values (child elements can)

attributes are not easily expandable (for future changes)

attributes cannot describe structures (child elements can)

Metadata (data about data) should be stored as attributes, and that data itself should be stored as elements.

Reference: http://www.w3schools.com/DTD/dtd_el_vs_attr.asp

edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

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answered Aug 08 '11 at 11:20

Kirill Polishchuk

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Be careful when posting copy and paste boilerplate/verbatim answers to multiple questions, these tend to be flagged as "spammy" by the community. – Kev Aug 09 '11 at 11:53
@Kev, I copied my own answer and added string to newer post, so it isn't exact duplicate... :-) – Kirill Polishchuk Aug 09 '11 at 11:55
@Kev, 90% of questions in SO are duplicates...., therefore they have similar answers. – Kirill Polishchuk Aug 09 '11 at 11:56

Is processing of "attribute" different from "element"

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