Shawn just to add to this story I have seen on a simple google search that attributes are known to be fast but there is reason why.
Reference
Quote:
The primary key in an XML structure, the one used to identify specific objects, has a requirement that it be unique. Typically for XML structures, this uniqueness will come in the form of an ID of some sort. For the sample characters document, the ID is actually an attribute called "id" attached to the node. Because most parsers are able to parse attributes faster than elements and because an ID is less a describing property of the object and more a name for that object, you should keep IDs and ID references as attributes within your document structure for best efficiency.
But using attributes as child element has its problems too.
Quote:
Some of the problems with using attributes are:
* attributes cannot contain multiple values (child elements can)
* attributes are not easily expandable (for future changes)
* attributes cannot describe structures (child elements can)
* attributes are more difficult to manipulate by program code
* attribute values are not easy to test against a Document Type Definition (DTD) - which is used to define the legal elements of an XML document.
If you use attributes as containers for data, you end up with documents that are difficult to read and maintain. Try to use elements to describe data. Use attributes only to provide information that is not relevant to the data.
_________________________
Life is fine.
