Abstract
Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a universal format defined by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) that can be used to create structured documents and data. XML can be used to format any kind of structured data, including bibliogaphic data. Library catalogs consist of bibliographic data and information on the location of the data within the library collection. This paper outlines the main features of XML and discusses its application to library catalogs. The World Wide Web (WWW) is a globally distributed hypertext system that contains a large number of digital documents, known as network resources, Metadata describes the network resources and other kinds of documents. A library catalog is an example of metadata, since the catalog describes the library collection. The Resource Description Framework (RDF) is a set of definitions that is used to write metadata in a unified format. RDF syntax conforms to XML specifications. To apply XML to library catalogs, the catalog data should be written using RDF guidelines. Library catalogs written in RDF could then be interchanged with library systems and other information systems.
