Best way to create dynamic xml?

[Breakpoint]

I am not to knowledgable in programming for xml so I wanted to find the best answer.

I was curious what is the best way to create a dynamic xml file.

The only way I have done it so far is creating a .php file that echos out xml messages containing content from my database. And then creating a .htaccess file that turns the .php file into an .xml file. I did this method when I created my RSS Feed.

Is there a better way to do this?

 

[uplinked]

*shrugs* You're pretty much doing it right.
There are PHP helper classes to generate XML, etc, and you don't "have" to use the .htaccess trick to make it a .xml (a .php file with an XML MIME type and XML headers is usually fine), but if you're trying to go SQL->XML, going through PHP is probably your best bet.

 

[Breakpoint]

Does the MIME type change the file name tho?

I'm looking for changing filename.php to filename.xml, I don't think a MIME type would do that, or am I wrong? The htaccess changes the name tho.

 

[uplinked]

in this-file-generates-xml.php:
<?php
header ("content-type: text/xml");
echo '<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>';
echo $my_xml;
?>

If you really want the file extension to be XML, the htaccess trick is correct. However, this is unnecessary, and you can parse the XML regardless of the file extension.