以下是一个同时具有简单和复杂成员类型的例子。它显示两层引用。注意"Author"accssor元素的"href"属性是对相应具有"id"属性的值的引用。"Address"与之类似。
<e:Book>
<title>My Life and Work</title>
<author href="#Person-1"/>
</e:Book>
<e:Person id="Person-1">
<name>Henry Ford</name>
<address href="#Address-2"/>
</e:Person>
<e:Address id="Address-2">
<email>mailto:henryford@hotmail.com</email>
<web>http://www.henryford.com</web>
</e:Address>
当"Person"的值和"Address"的值是multi-reference时，上面的形式是正确的。如果它们是single-reference，就必须用嵌入的形式，如下所示：
<e:Book>
<title>My Life and Work</title>
<author>
<name>Henry Ford</name>
<address>
<email>mailto:henryford@hotmail.com</email>
<web>http://www.henryford.com</web>
</address>
</author>
</e:Book>
如果添加一个限制，任意两个人都不会有相同的地址，并且地址可以是街道或Email地址，一本书可以有两个作者，编码如下：
<e:Book>
<title>My Life and Work</title>
<firstauthor href="#Person-1"/>
<secondauthor href="#Person-2"/>
</e:Book>
<e:Person id="Person-1">
<name>Henry Ford</name>
<address xsi:type="m:Electronic-address">
<email>mailto:henryford@hotmail.com</email>
<web>http://www.henryford.com</web>
</address>
</e:Person>
<e:Person id="Person-2">
<name>Samuel Crowther</name>
<address xsi:type="n:Street-address">
<street>Martin Luther King Rd</street>
<city>Raleigh</city>
<state>North Carolina</state>
</address>
</e:Person>
序列化可以包含对不在同一个资源的值的引用：
<e:Book>
<title>Paradise Lost</title>
<firstauthor href="http://www.dartmouth.edu/~milton/"/>
</e:Book>
以下是描述上面结构的schema片断：
<element name="Book" type="tns:Book"/>
<complexType name="Book">
<!-- Either the following group must occur or else the
href attribute must appear, but not both. -->
<sequence minOccurs="0" maxOccurs="1">
<element name="title" type="xsd:string"/>
<element name="firstauthor" type="tns:Person"/>
<element name="secondauthor" type="tns:Person"/>
</sequence>
<attribute name="href" type="uriReference"/>
<attribute name="id" type="ID"/>
<anyAttribute namespace="##other"/>
</complexType>
<element name="Person" base="tns:Person"/>
<complexType name="Person">
<!-- Either the following group must occur or else the
href attribute must appear, but not both. -->
<sequence minOccurs="0" maxOccurs="1">
<element name="name" type="xsd:string"/>
<element name="address" type="tns:Address"/>
</sequence>
<attribute name="href" type="uriReference"/>
<attribute name="id" type="ID"/>
<anyAttribute namespace="##other"/>
</complexType>
<element name="Address" base="tns:Address"/>
<complexType name="Address">
<!-- Either the following group must occur or else the
href attribute must appear, but not both. -->
<sequence minOccurs="0" maxOccurs="1">
<element name="street" type="xsd:string"/>
<element name="city" type="xsd:string"/>
<element name="state" type="xsd:string"/>
</sequence>
<attribute name="href" type="uriReference"/>
<attribute name="id" type="ID"/>
<anyAttribute namespace="##other"/>
</complexType>
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