===This part to inblosam===

But then again isn't a tabled database "simply organized and parsed" not to mention smaller in size due to the omission of the redundant record and field markup? I could take that a step further and say that tabled data loads faster on large data sources (disk to memory) as a result vs. XML data sources.

===This part for everyone else===

Everyone so far has been "portability-this" and "parsable-that". This is not a question of how one can deal with XML data sources but rather WHY one would choose such a format over a tabluar format (so far I really haven't seen a reason that I couldn't apply to tabled data sources).

Portability, converting, and parsing are not ADVANTAGES over tabluar databases as the same can be said for tabled data.

Once again: Just because you can doesn't mean you should.

Give me some XML database PROs that CANNOT be applied to tabluar databases (flat-files, etc.)

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Sean Shrum
http://www.shrum.net