Custom Web Publishing with XML and XSLT

Table Of Contents
14 FileMaker Server Custom Web Publishing with XML and XSLT
Comparing PHP to XML and XSLT
The following sections provide some guidelines for determining the best solution for your site.
Reasons to choose PHP
1 PHP is a more powerful, object-oriented procedural scripting language, but is relatively easy to learn.
There are many resources available for training, development, and support.
1 The FileMaker API for PHP enables data and logic stored in a FileMaker Pro database to be accessed
and published on the web, or exported to other applications.
1 PHP lets you use conditional logic to control page construction or flow.
1 PHP provides programming language functionality for constructing many types of logic on a site page.
1 PHP is one of the most popular web scripting languages.
1 PHP is an open source language, available at http://php.net.
1 PHP enables access to a wide variety of third-party components that you can integrate into your solutions.
Note For more information about Custom Web Publishing with PHP, see FileMaker Server Custom Web
Publishing with PHP.
Reasons to choose XML and XSLT
1 FileMaker XML request parameter syntax is designed for database interaction, simplifying solution
development.
1 XML and XSLT are W3C standards.
1 XML is a machine and human readable format that supports Unicode, enabling data to be communicated
in any written language.
1 XML is well-suited for presenting records, lists and tree-structured data.
1 XSLT lets you transform XML output into structured text documents such as RSS, RTF, vCard.
1 You can use XSLT to transform XML output from one grammar to another.
1 Templates make it easy to apply conditional formatting to variable data.
1 You can use FMPXMLRESULT based stylesheets for Custom Web Publishing and for XML export
from FileMaker Pro databases.
1 FileMaker Server handles FileMaker XSLT stylesheet processing, preventing unauthorized access to
data that might be unprotected using client-side XSLT stylesheets.