XML (eXtensible Markup Language), a structured text format developed to describe data to be shared by dissimilar systems. XML has become a standard for communications between systems. To make handling XML-formatted data simpler and more error resistant, NAV provides XMLports, a data import/export object. In addition to processing XML-formatted data, XMLports can also handle a wide variety of other text file formats, including CSV files, generic flat files, and so on. XML-formatted data is text based, with each piece of information structured in one of two basic formats: Elements or Attributes. An Element is the overall logical unit of information, while an Attribute is a property of an Element. They are formatted as follows:

• <Tag>elementvalue</Tag> (an Element format)
• <Tag AttribName="attribute datavalue"> (an Attribute format))