My unpopular take is that maps are not my favorite feature within XSLT 3.0.
One reason is that I found it hard to process maps in an XSLT-idiomatic
way. But I guess I haven’t done enough research yet because, as I found
out just now, I can actually write template rules like this:
<xsl:template match=".[. instance of map(xs:anyAtomicType, item()*)]">
Constructing (nested, in particular) maps tends also to be more verbose
than just constructing an XML structure. (Imagine, an XSLT guy
complaining about verbosity!)
But I seem to be the guy whose natural instinct is to put every
transient data structure into a document-node(element(*)), on which I
can use the key() function, anyway. Call me old-fashioned.
Let’s rank what other people have liked so far and add some more.
XPath 3.1 language, functions and operators, including:
conversion from/to JSON;
syntactic shortcuts such as !, ||, and =>;
single-argument fn:tokenize() and fn:string-join()
trigonometric functions;
maps+arrays (yes, maps&arrays rank top, but only as part of the
overall XPath 3.1 package);
higher-order functions (a pity they are not available in Saxon HE –
we would use them frequently in our open-source XProc/XSLT offerings; we
aren't using them in closed source projects either because they often
rely on our open-source libraries);
fn:parse-xml();
fn:serialize();
fn:sort()
let;
etc.
Dynamic evaluation
XSLT and XQuery Serialization 3.1 support, including easy JSON and HTML5
document writing
Streaming (haven’t used it much though, same for accumulators,
xsl:merge, xsl:fork)
try/catch (no one mentioned this so far)
Text value templates
Packages (I’ve actually used them), visibility, xsl:override etc.
xsl:context-item (a valuable debugging aid), no experience with
xsl:assert so far though
fn:transform() (haven’t used it much though, being an XProc orchestrator
most of the time; the only place I'd really like to use it is Saxon-JS,
which doesn't support it)
mode declarations (using it, but it can get more verbose than declaring
an identity template for many modes at once)
xsl:iterate (using it rarely)
xsl:where-populated, xsl:on-empty (not using it, but I have seen
non-streaming people adopting it as syntactic sugar)
On 03.10.2019 21:31, David Rudel fwqhgads(_at_)gmail(_dot_)com wrote:
Maps.
On Thu, Oct 3, 2019 at 12:59 PM Liam R. E. Quin liam(_at_)fromoldbooks(_dot_)org
<mailto:liam(_at_)fromoldbooks(_dot_)org> <xsl-list-service(_at_)lists(_dot_)mulberrytech(_dot_)com
<mailto:xsl-list-service(_at_)lists(_dot_)mulberrytech(_dot_)com>> wrote:
While i was preparing for a course on XSLT 3 later this month, i
wondered whether other people would have favourite features that were
introduced in XSLT 3. I know i do.
What do you find most useful? Or like the best?
Liam
--
Liam Quin, https://www.delightfulcomputing.com/
Available for XML/Document/Information Architecture/XSLT/
XSL/XQuery/Web/Text Processing/A11Y training, work & consulting.
Barefoot Web-slave, antique illustrations: http://www.fromoldbooks.org
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