Building XML query forms and reports with XQForms

Abstract

XQForms is the first generator of Web-based query forms and reports for XML data. XQForms takes inputs (i) an XML Schema that models the source data to be queried and presented, (ii) a declarative specification, called XQForm annotation, of the query forms and reports that will be generated, and (iii) a set of template presentation libraries. The output is a set of query form and report pages that provide automated query construction and report formatting so that the end users can query and browse the underlying XML data. XQForms separates content (given by the XML Schema of the source data), query form semantics (specified by the annotations) and presentation of the pages (provided by the template library). The system architecture is modular and consists of four main components: (a) a collection of query controls that generate query fragments based on the values that the end user submits via the query form page; a set of query controls makes up a query form; (b) a graphical user interface, called XQForms Editor, for building the annotations; (c) a compiler that creates the query form pages based on the annotations and the template presentation libraries; (d) a run-time engine that constructs the queries that are executed against the XML data, and creates the reports by rendering the results using the template presentation libraries. All the components of the system have been implemented and an online demonstration is available at http://www.db.ucsd.edu/xqforms/.