Towards an XML Adaptation/Alteration Control Framework

Controlling XML data flow has become imperative due to its widespread regarding information exchange between different systems. Controlling XML data falls into two main categories: Securing/Protecting the data and Altering/Adapting the data. While the first one aims at protecting XML data and securing it against theft, the second aims at modifying and adapting the data to satisfy user/application criteria (e.g., XML filtering and adaptation). Our paper falls into the second category and presents our XML Alteration/Adaptation control framework allowing both novice and expert programmers to describe basic (e.g., syntax operations) and complex (e.g., semantic operations) controllers in an easy to use manner based on Petri-Nets. In essence, existing techniques have 2 main drawbacks related to addressing different control scopes and generally requiring a high level of expertise in their respective areas. The framework proposed here provides means for users to create Alteration/Adaptation aggregation functions based on composition of existing system functions (e.g., defined in the system libraries), user defined functions built from scratch, or by combining existent aggregation functions along with user-defined functions while maintaining simplicity in their description.