First of all, launch a GUI instance of BaseX. Depending on your operating system, double click on the '''BaseX GUI''' start icon or run the <code>basexgui</code> script. Beside that, some more [[Startup#BaseX GUI|startup options]] are available.
==Create Database== Select ''Database'' → ''New'' and browse to an XML document of your choice. As an example, you can start with the {{Code|etc/factbook.xml}} document, which contains statistical information on the worlds' countries. It is included in our official releases and can also be [http://files.basex.org/xml/factbook.xml downloaded] (1.3 MB). If you type nothing in the input field, an empty database will be created. Next, choose the ''OK'' button, and BaseX will create a database that you can visually explore and query.
If no XML document is available, the [[#Text Editor|Text Editor]] can also be used to create an initial XML document. After saving the entered XML document to harddisk, it can be supplied as database input in the above dialog.