What Is Simple API For XML (SAX)?

SAX is a programming interface for XML documents. It's like a box of chocolates—you never know what you'll get. The SAX API is event-based and sequential, meaning it only processes the document one piece at a time. It does this by handing you an event object every time something happens in the XML document, which you can do whatever you want. For example, if there's a tag start, the parser will hand you an event object where you can count some code to handle what happens when that tag starts (e. g., adding an attribute). And then, when that tag ends, it passes another event object with your code to handle what happens when it ends (e. g., closing the attribute). It is named after the XML specification's Document Object Model (DOM) specification, which specifies an API for accessing elements in an XML document. SAX defines a set of callback methods invoked by the parser as it encounters characters and another markup in the document being parsed. You know you're always so busy that you must do everything at once? We don't have time to wait for our XML documents to load in a big, lumpy file. We need them to stream! That's why we use SAX. We get the Infoset from XML documents with SAX in a linear and continuous stream. Our applications get what they need right away, and they don't have to go back and reread any data they've already accessed. SAX is unidirectional when searching large documents for small pieces of information, so it doesn't allow for backtracking. It also provides a mechanism for aborting the process once we've found what we want—and when it comes down to it, that means less work for us and more time for enjoying ourselves! SAX is the way to go if you want an interface that's simpler than DOM but still lets you access data quickly and easily.