This version correctly implements XPointer with the limitation that it can only process single-xpointer fragment ids and does not address any of the XPointer-specific extension functions (unless Saxon happens to implement those). It will report errors for fragment IDs that are not XPointers. I think this version is pretty stable--there's not much more functionality I can add to it.

In this page you will find two descriptions of two different implementations of XPointer at the University of Bologna, each one part of a larger project.

In Jan 2001 people at the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) found that their new generation of hypertext markup language was infringing on a patent from Sun Microsystems. By a decree of the US patent office, Sun has become the owner of the idea of adding a search word to a link in such a way that the browser will scroll to that word.

At the present time (late 2002), XPointer is divided among four specifications: a "framework" which forms the basis for indentifying XML fragments, a positional element addressing scheme, a scheme for namespaces, and a scheme for XPath-based addressing. The XPointer language is designed to address structural aspects of XML, including text content and other information objects created as a result of parsing the document. Thus, it could be used to point to a section of a document highlighted by a user through a mouse drag action.

In a minority opinion, Eve Maler and Paul Grosso suggest that "that XPointer would benefit from offering the option of a much more modest feature set."

XPointer enables addressing into the internal structures of XML documents. In particular, it provides for specific reference to elements, character strings, and other parts of XML documents, whether or not they bear an explicit ID attribute.

This is a API to handle XML Pointers Base implementation.

This section describes why you should use a XPointer and how you can make use of it!

The XPointer element() scheme is intended to be used with the XPointer Framework [XPtrFrame] to allow basic addressing of XML elements.

The XPointer xmlns() scheme is intended to be used with the XPointer Framework [XPtrFrame] to allow correct interpretation of namespace prefixes in pointers, for instance, namespace-qualified scheme names and namespace-qualified element or attribute names appearing within scheme data.

Since Elliotte Rusty Harold recommended "complete rejection of this specification until such time as Sun's patent can be dealt with more reasonably," the XML-dev mailing list has been discussing the licensing terms for the patent.

This document is a liaison statement from XML Linking Working Group to the XML Information Set working group. Because the XPointer specification under development in the XML Linking WG must refer to structural parts of XML documents, the structure it addresses must be explicit.

The following statements are the patent disclosures and license commitments associated with the Last Call drafts of the XPointer framework, the xmlns and element schemes, and the draft of the xpointer scheme, as of June 10, 2002. The statements were provided by members of the XML Linking WG as required by W3C procedure. These statements may be subject to modification based on discussions during the W3C Advisory Council review period.

This specification defines the XML Pointer Language (XPointer) Framework, an extensible system for XML addressing that underlies additional XPointer scheme specifications. The framework is intended to be used as a basis for fragment identifiers for any resource whose Internet media type is one of text/xml, application/xml, text/xml-external-parsed-entity, or application/xml-external-parsed-entity. Other XML-based media types are also encouraged to use this framework in defining their own fragment identifier languages.

This document details the responses made by the XML Linking Working Group to issues raised during the Candidate Recommendation (beginning 7 June 1999 and ending xx 1999) review of XPointer . Comments were provided by XML Linking Working Group members, other W3C Working Groups, and the public via the www-xml-linking-comments@w3.org (archive) mailing list.

Today, the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) issues the XML Pointer Language (XPointer) Recommendation - the XPointer Framework, the XPointer element()Scheme, and the XPointer xmlns() Scheme. The XPointer Framework provides a lightweight extensible model for identifying parts of XML documents. The XPointer element() scheme allows the user to point to specific elements in XML documents and data, while the XPointer xmlns() scheme brings the power of XML Namespaces to the XPointer Framework, giving a way to avoid name collisions between schemes and provide namespace binding information for use within other schemes.