I have to disagree. I think that XML is better used for machine-consumable processes rather than human-edited ones. The wealth of tools available mitigate the n

I have to disagree. I think that XML is better used for machine-consumable processes rather than human-edited ones. The wealth of tools available mitigate the need to roll your own data format and help ensure that your output will be usable by anyone with a (ubiquitous) XML parser. If your data will be used by an arbitrary 3rd party there are a lot of advantages to using XML. Optimizing for ease of development is certainly a good goal too. Ease of development equates directly to lowered maintenance costs and redevelopment of poor code. In my business at least the maintenance costs far outweigh the initial expenditures when evaluating different technologies. EDIT: I agree that SOAP is abominable. But that's due to its overall architecture rather than its use of XML.