[thelist] XML parsing the homemade way

[Daniel Fascia]

In the next few weeks I have to design some Computer Learning packages for my medical school. In a presentation I gave
them about it all, I promised them an Open XML based customisable interface which would access learning modules based
on XML...

This is very convenient since they will be able to add new XML modules to it and it should be a bit futureproof when Im no
longer around to maintain this...

I have looked at some of the XML parsers available in various languages and it would seem simpler for my project to create
my own system as follows:

1) Open XML learning module as text file
2) Parse file using string handling regexpressions of PHP or ASP/Javascript
3) Fire parsed data into one of 5 body templates as defined in the XML file

I am wondering if this is significantly slower and what potential risks are with this system vs a traditional database (which is
available) or using a language's inbuilt XML parser such as that in PHP?

Love some advice from anyone who has tried such a system