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ptc-9533431-Visitor
1-Visitor
May 20, 2010
Question

FOSI approach vs XSLT

  • May 20, 2010
  • 21 replies
  • 3504 views
I've been doing lots of work in XSLT/FO but I'm having to switch gears and
work on a FOSI.

I'm in the XSLT/XPATH mindset and I know there are similar capabilities,
but I'm wondering if the approaches to problems would be different. The
I'm currently considering is transformation, specifically moving large
sections around. So I have a rear section that can contain appendices,
list of effective pages, index, etc. In my DTD I want to set a specific
order and repeatability on these objects. So I have the following:

* appendix
? index
? lep

well some groups might want the lep in front of the index. With XSLT I
would just choose to process the lep before the index and I wouldn't
change the physical order in the content. FOSIs I've seen in the past seem
to just process things in place in terms of large objects. They generate
text and such but I don't think I've seen much reorganization of the
content.

Is this a limitation of FOSIs or just the [programming style of the writer?

..dan

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    ptc-19080751-Visitor
    1-Visitor
    May 25, 2010
    I should confess I have a grudge against XSL because it did not become what it was supposed to be. XML was supposed to be "SGML for the Web," and XSL was supposed to format it. Specifically, browsers were supposed to display native XML formatted with XSL. The idea, as Soft Quad founder Yuri Rubinsky put it, was to change the Web from a giant brochure into a giant database.


    Instead, XSL became a way to transform XML into HTML for display in a browser, which led to XSLT as a general transformation engine like the first stage in DSSSL. XSL-FO was tacked on at the end pretty much as an after thought. And browsers continued to be HTML-based.

    Frankly, I still want that giant XML-based database. Of course, XSL couldn't be used to format an XML-based web because the transformation phase makes it too slow, which is why Arbortext doesn't use it for the Edit window display.

    A few comments are embedded below.


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