XML Exercise: A Recipe from Another Time

Before you begin

Before beginning this assignment, you should prepare your workspace: Where do you want to do your coding homework this semester? You will be doing most of your coding work for this course in the <oXygen/> XML Editor. This is installed in the campus computer labs, and you may also install it on any other computer(s) you plan to work with this semester. Also, before beginning homework assignments, you need to read the related tutorials we have posted (plus notes you took in class) and keep these open and handy to consult as you are working. For the very first assignment, here is what you will need:

• Install the <oXygen/> software on your own computer(s) Follow the instructions and apply the license key we have posted on Canvas.
• Read our Introduction to XML
• Read File Conventions for Canvas Assignments, so you will know how to name this and most other homework files you submit on Canvas.

Goals

This assignment should give you experience with:

1. Writing well-formed XML using elements and attributes.
2. Making decisions in how to write XML so that it binds related kinds of information together by:
   • Thinking of elements and attributes working together (like file folders with labels attached).
   • Nesting elements that relate to each other.
3. Using basic features of the <oXygen/> software environment.

Scenario

First, read this recipe for Shrewsbury cakes from the Cooking in the Archives. Now, imagine you are collecting recipes like this to mark all of them in similar XML, and your XML will help build a digital archive to help chefs at an authentic historical tavern at a place like Colonial Williamsburg. You will need to keep track of kinds and quantities of ingredients required.

XML is written to store information, and when we apply it to a situation with numbers and units, like with coding recipes, the code we write can help make computerized calculations, and optimize searching across a collection for particular kinds of ingredients. Your code might be designed to help categorize ingredients by what part of the grocery store they can be found in. And it might help food historians to translate the historic language of food preparation into modern terms. The challenge of the assignment is to write code that helps categorize ingredients, mark necessary equipment, and stages in making the cakes in historic and contemporary terms. The way you approach this with XML is up to you.

Coding the document in <oXygen/>

• First, highlight and copy the text of the section titled The Recipe. Optional: You may also include the paragraph above that section to keep the source information.
• Open a new XML document in <oXygen/>. Click on the icon at top left that looks like a piece of paper with a folded corner (or go to File and New...), type XML in the filter window, and click the Create button to launch a new XML document.
• Paste in the recipe, and begin marking it in XML. Make sure your XML is well-formed (with a root element) and apply elements and add attributes in a way that helps systematically label and track information.
• Tips: Watch the color of the square in the upper right corner: if it is green, your code is well-formed, but if it turns angry red, you will know there is an error, perhaps tangled tags or a missing angle bracket, or a missing root element. Notice how <oXygen/> generates a closing tag every time you type your own start tag. One handy trick is to you use your mouse to highlight text you want to wrap in an element, and use Control+E in Windows (or Command+E on a Mac) to bring up a window to enter an element name. (You have to add the attributes after you set an element name.)
• Save your work frequently, and name your file using our standard form for homework names.

Curating the document: Suggestions for XML markup

Frequently the XML code we write is designed for digital curation, for preserving and collecting resources. Usually we would not rewrite the base text of a recipe like this, but we would apply markup around passages, so that our markup supplies some information in a more systematic way. For example, spaces and formatting on the page tell our human eyes something about the document, like how to distinguish each item on a list. That formatting information is not preserved in XML, and so one of the first things we mark are the structural pieces. What are the important parts of this recipe that you need to distinguish from other parts? Use XML markup to tag those. Then, what is the important information that you can label with markup?

Try not to write markup that copies the same words and phrases in the text: think of categories and standard units you can supply so that your markup adds new value to the text. Your markup could organize into categories and steps, quantities and units. Can you write code that traces ingredients and how they are mentioned in the historic and modern recipes?

There is no single way to do this exercise, but we want you to think about how you nest levels of information (elements within elements), and the relationship between elements and attributes in XML.

When, where, and how to submit the assignment

Check and make sure you saved your file following our homework file naming rules, including giving it a .xml file extension. Submit your XML file on Canvas on Assignments (for XML Exercise 1) before our next class.