How to use binary data with XML?

[xml]

Hmm... so when Sun talks about serializing objects in XML           
(such as in http://www.javasoft.com/xml/ncfocus.html), they must be  
talking about storing binary data as well.

Using mime attachments and such is so inefficient... would they really
opt for storing binary object attributes using text-encoding approaches?

Given a decent editor, such as the ones in NeXTStep/Mac OS X Server,
you can copy/paste binary data from XML files trivially, while in
Windows and standard Unix you're pretty much stuck with editing in
either text or binary modes.

Since I use the former, I'm used to seeing binary and text mix and
if the binary was inside of a (predictable) XML tag that would be
just dandy!

Granted on other platforms it would be a problem to edit such files,
but should file editing concerns dictate how efficiently data is 
stored?  

Thomas

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