Extensible Markup Language (XML) is an extremely simple dialect of SGML which is completely described in this document. The goal is to enable generic SGML to be served, received, and processed on the Web in the way that is now possible with HTML. For this reason, XML has been designed for ease of implementation, and for interoperability with both SGML and HTML. Note on status of this document: This is even more of a moving target than the typical W3C working draft. Several important decisions on the details of XML are still outstanding members of the W3C SGML Working Group will recognize these areas of particular volatility in the spec, but those who are not intimately familiar with the deliberative process should be careful to avoid actions based on the content of this document, until the notice you are now reading has been removed.