Extensible Markup Language (XML) has emerged as a widely-adopted standard for the exchange and formatting of data. Advantages of XML include its simplicity and the ease with which a person with limited technical knowledge can read and understand the raw XML data. As such, XML is largely self-documenting, which makes it relatively simple to debug invalid data.
Various fisheries management organizations around the world are already using XML to represent fisheries data. In particular, XML specifications exist for electronic logbook data. Both the European Commission and the Australian Fisheries Management Authority have published XML specifications for their particular e-logs requirements.
FisheryStandards.org has a current project to establish a generic XML standard for fishing trip data. To review the proposed fishing trip XML standard and to contribute your thoughts and opinions, click the link below.
If you would like to comment on XML for fisheries data in general, please visit the forum via the link below:
