>Do you hand-code XML?

On occasion.

But when I do, I use angle brackets like so:

<person>
    <firstname>John</firstname>
    <lastname>Ryan</lastname>
</person>

as opposed to:

Node Person
   SubNode FirstName
      John
   EndSubNode
   SubNode LastName
      Ryan
   EndSubNode
EndNode

Surprisingly, the brackets seem more effecient at this point.