joomla-extensions

I am using different model in joomla than view's own model that is similar to its name by assigning it from controller, like: $view->setModel($this->getModel('user')); Now how can I use its method getSingleUser($user_id) in view. In an example in joomla documentation , it is using is some thing like this: $this->get("data1","model2"); So I assume data1 is name of method in model2? If so then how can I pass argument that is userid in my case. I know this is easy thing that many of joomla developers have done but I am sort of jack of all sort of developer and new to joomla so I am expecting you

I am developing a Joomla component for Joomla 2.5. Since it's supposed to output XML, I most defenitely don't want to display the surrounding template. I have tried appending to the url: ?tmpl=component ?format=raw ?tmpl=raw But the first will generate some HTML around the content output and the second gives me a 500 error. The third one generates no output at all. I assume it's looking for a template named "raw", because any other gibberish template name I put there gives me the same result. How can I output XML from my component without any of the additional Joomla + template HTML?