XSIL is an XML

XML

Extensible Markup Language is a set of rules for encoding documents in machine-readable form. It is defined in the XML 1.0 Specification produced by the W3C, and several other related specifications, all gratis open standards....

-based transport language for scientific data, supporting the inclusion of both in-file data and metadata. The language comes with an extensible Java

Java (programming language)

Java is a programming language originally developed by James Gosling at Sun Microsystems and released in 1995 as a core component of Sun Microsystems' Java platform. The language derives much of its syntax from C and C++ but has a simpler object model and fewer low-level facilities...

 object

Object (computer science)

In computer science, an object is any entity that can be manipulated by the commands of a programming language, such as a value, variable, function, or data structure...

 model. The language's elementary objects include Param (arbitrary association between a keyword

Keyword (computer programming)

In computer programming, a keyword is a word or identifier that has a particular meaning to the programming language. The meaning of keywords — and, indeed, the meaning of the notion of keyword — differs widely from language to language....

 and a value), Array, Table (a set of column headings followed by a set of records), and Stream, which enables one to either encapsulate data

Data

The term data refers to qualitative or quantitative attributes of a variable or set of variables. Data are typically the results of measurements and can be the basis of graphs, images, or observations of a set of variables. Data are often viewed as the lowest level of abstraction from which...

 inside the XSIL file

Computer file

A computer file is a block of arbitrary information, or resource for storing information, which is available to a computer program and is usually based on some kind of durable storage. A file is durable in the sense that it remains available for programs to use after the current program has finished...

 or point to an external data source.

BFD

Binary Format Description language

The Binary Format Description language is an extension of XSIL which has added conditionals and the ability to reference files by their stream numbers, rather than by their public URLs. A template written in the BFD language can be applied to a binary data file to produce a file with that data...

is an XML dialect based on XSIL.

External links

• XSIL: Extensible Scientific Interchange Language