EML stands for Enterprise Markup Language. It is a server-side html
manipulating language that is installed on the web server. Using its own set
of html-like tags, it allows the server to parse and change the content of
web pages on the fly, before they are sent to the user's browser. It can be
connected to a MySQL database, allowing the web pages themselves to manipulate
data, show data from the database and dynamically build web content on the fly.
As well as being able to connect to a database, EML is aware of cookies, environment variables and arguments from forms or the URL of the current page and
can make decisions about content based on these.
New features added to version 1.4:
- SQLROWS - retrieve the number of rows returned from the database outside of REPEAT statements
- dataset.sqlrows - the same as above, but available in FOR and IF statements
- FOR - create for loops for more robust flow control
EML is free. It is an open source application released under the terms of the GNU Public License. The current version of EML is 1.4, build 2004-04-17.
PHP is a good package, but it is difficult to learn for non-programmers. EML has only around 12 main commands, so it can be easily grasped by people who are only trained in html. It is still powerful and flexible enough to solve most of the needs of Internet application developers who understand more complex languages. EML's compiled size is only 22Kbytes. Each time the EML code is run from the web server, it needs only 22Kb of memory, whereas perl - for example - takes up 2 megs. This tiny, compiled, code size means that EML can be appropriate even for serving the dynamic front pages of sites with hundreds of thousands of hits.
Most markup languages are designed as consumer products, which means that they are
designed very broadly to allow for all sorts of different server configurations. This
fine for small sites, but does not allow the sort of power, speed or flexibility that
EML does. EML is configured carefully for the server and database environment that
it is installed in. It has only eleven mark-up commands, compared to the hundreds
supported by other mark-up products. This is possible because of the tight marraige
between the EML and the server environment.
EML can do anything that other mark-up languages can, but with a smaller, faster code
base and a simpler syntax. The latter allows quick training of HTML personnel. Our
philosophy is that SQL is a powerful programming tool, and that only
a thin server tool is needed to vastly expand the power and flexibility of a web site.
EML is the link that allows a web site to become as dynamic and powerful as a stand-alone
application.
EML allows multiple, nested IF statements, recursion and programmatic hooks into other
server-side applications, making it capable of highly complex and flexible applications
without undue memory or disk requirements. EML can be run from the command line, allowing
complete integration between web-based data interactions and behind-the-scenes data and
system administration.
