Sitekit CMS Application Programming Interface - XML Search
The XML Search API provides a business logic layer for searches of XML documents hosted externally or within the file library. It is designed to deliver the benefits of web services seamlessly within a single integrated environment (Sitekit CMS). It allows bespoke systems to be built on top of Sitekit CMS and hosted as part of the same system, rather than as separate hosted entities. Usage of the XML Search API allows a developer to make use of web services without the need for a separate server, separate maintenance and multiple connectors.
This single integrated approach is also useful to developers who do not have the ability, or hardware required to set up their own web services to make use of pre-built Sitekit CMS functionality.
Purpose
The XML Search API should be used where the information provided to visitors through web pages is not stored as web pages within the system, but is to be stored and maintained as a database.
The tool will perform various queries on any type of database (which is in a standard interoperable format) depending on parameters specified either by the user, or specified by the original integrator. The tool will query data and return a subset of the data. The returned data will also be in a standard interoperable format.
The XML Search API will connect directly to the data and act as an interface between the data and the systems which need to query the data.
Although Sitekit CMS architecturally takes a page based approach, XML Data Islands allow a web system to be built in an object based fashion (where a site is built of data objects rather than of pages). The XML Search API allows a bespoke system to be built within the Sitekit CMS environment, whilst interoperating with the core functionality of Sitekit CMS in a non-obtrusive manner.
