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RE: Transform XML to XML

2005-08-25 15:09:02
Yes, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to take you to task. (Your style of
approach made me think I could take off the kid gloves. 

No problem, you saw my smiley, right?

And besides, you'd already figured out for yourself that you needed
an identity transform, without knowing what to call it. That in itself
requires a leap of insight into how to approach problems of
transformation, which is very good grounds for hope.) 

Thanks for the kudos.  Yes, I actually think I have done some pretty
sophisticated stuff already.  But I still don't think I have my head
around the nuances, and each time I sit down to try something it just
doesn't work right.  It's like I loose the understanding I have every
time I walk away from XSLT for longer than a week or two.  Last night I
beat my head against my monitor for five hours trying to do something
what I thought should be simple, and never got it done. :(

Mainly I wanted to convey the word that your worries are over (well
okay I exaggerate): here, all the subtleties of XSLT's weird ways are
understood, appreciated and approved of (mostly) -- and explained not
infrequently.

That does give me some good comfort, thanks.

One thing I do really dislike about XSLT, at least from what I
understand, is there doesn't seem to be a way to write robust code in
XSLT; if my input XML is off by a bit (i.e. well-formed but not
validated by a schema), or if I make a boneheaded change to the XSL, the
transform may not output what I expect but there's little way for me to
catch the error without painstaking proofreading after each transform
(scenario: after somethings been printed for a while; opps, looks our
XSL forgot to include that chapter!)

So if the new bits of information -- about the identity transform,
the built-in default templates and their function (which the identity
template overrides), and the difference and marvelous complimentarity
between matching (xsl:template) and selecting (xsl:apply-templates) --
don't all by themselves flood your brain with understanding -- again,
please feel free to post.

Now that you mention it...why are their default templates and is there
any way to turn them off?  They are almost never what I want, and they
almost always seem to give me conceptual trouble when I'm trying to
figure out why my transform isn't working like I expect.

Also, matching and selecting do confuse me.  I'm best when I do
<xsl:call-template> :)  Also, the matching and selecting part seem so
fragile, like one tiny thing is off and they don't work correctly.  Is
there anything short you can tell me that might help me grok those?
BTW, I own and have read about five total books on XSLT and on XPath,
and another four on XSL:FO.

-Mike
P.S. If you'd like to see the latest output from the biggest XSL project
I've worked on, you can find them here:
http://www.howtoselectguides.com/dotnet/pdf/ and
http://www.howtoselectguides.com/dotnet/obfuscators/   
The content for HTML format Guides are each in a large XML file (for
which I need to get a schema written.) 
I eventually want to use XSL:FO to create PDF files out of the XML too,
but that's a few days down the road. :)



-----Original Message-----
From: Wendell Piez [mailto:wapiez(_at_)mulberrytech(_dot_)com] 
Sent: Thursday, August 25, 2005 5:29 PM
To: xsl-list(_at_)lists(_dot_)mulberrytech(_dot_)com
Subject: RE: [xsl] Transform XML to XML

Mike,

At 04:11 PM 8/25/2005, you wrote:
That could be because your concept of what's happening internally 
is
inaccurate, leading you to mistaken ideas about the way things need to 
be set up so that everything will happen the way you want it.

Uh, well, duh!  :)

Yes, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to take you to task. (Your style of
approach made me think I could take off the kid gloves. And besides,
you'd already figured out for yourself that you needed an identity
transform, without knowing what to call it. That in itself requires a
leap of insight into how to approach problems of transformation, which
is very good grounds for hope.)

Of course that's the case.  I do find myself getting frustrated and 
almost angry at it because of how it behaves, but I guess that's my own

personal shortcoming. :)

Anywho, that's why I joined this list: to try to finally figure it out 
(and to vent every so often. :)

Please do: all venting about XSLT is on-topic (and so are responses as
long as the topic remains XSLT).

Mainly I wanted to convey the word that your worries are over (well okay
I
exaggerate): here, all the subtleties of XSLT's weird ways are
understood, appreciated and approved of (mostly) -- and explained not
infrequently.

So if the new bits of information -- about the identity transform, the
built-in default templates and their function (which the identity
template overrides), and the difference and marvelous complimentarity
between matching (xsl:template) and selecting (xsl:apply-templates) --
don't all by themselves flood your brain with understanding -- again,
please feel free to post.

Cheers,
Wendell


======================================================================
Wendell Piez                            
mailto:wapiez(_at_)mulberrytech(_dot_)com
Mulberry Technologies, Inc.                http://www.mulberrytech.com
17 West Jefferson Street                    Direct Phone: 301/315-9635
Suite 207                                          Phone: 301/315-9631
Rockville, MD  20850                                 Fax: 301/315-8285
----------------------------------------------------------------------
   Mulberry Technologies: A Consultancy Specializing in SGML and XML
======================================================================


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