<?xml version="1.0"?> 

<!--
	description:
	
		"Overview of the XSLT library"

	library: "Gobo Eiffel XSLT Library"
	copyright: "Copyright (c) 2004, Colin Adams and others"
	license: "MIT License"
	date: "$Date: 2007-10-07 22:38:47 -0700 (Sun, 07 Oct 2007) $"
	revision: "$Revision: 6109 $"
-->

<chapter xmlns="http://www.gobosoft.com/eiffel/gobo/documentation" id="xslt_overview">
  <chapterinfo>
    <copyright>
      <year>2004</year>
      <holder>Colin Adams and others</holder>
    </copyright>
    <author>
      <firstname>Colin</firstname>
      <surname>Adams</surname>
    </author>
    <email>colin@colina.demon.co.uk</email>
    <date>Monday, October 18th, 2004</date>
  </chapterinfo>
  <title>Overview of the XSLT library</title>
  <para>
    This chapter gives Eiffel programmers an introduction to the Gobo Eiffel XSLT library, which
    implements the World Wide Web Consortium's 
    <ulink url="http://www.w3.org/TR/xslt20/">XSLT 2.0 tranformation language</ulink>.
  </para>
  <para>
    The library supports a Basic XSLT processor, and is in line with the Recommendation.
  </para>
  <para>
    The support is not yet quite complete. The following features have yet to be implemented:
    <itemizedlist>
	<listitem>
	  <para>
	    Xsl:sort case-order attribute is not supported yet.
	  </para>
	</listitem>
	<listitem>
	  <para>
	    The functions unparsed-text() and unparsed-text-available() do not work properly
	    yet. They will probably work OK for 7-bit ASCII and UTF-8 files.
	  </para>
	</listitem>
	<listitem>
	  <para>
	    The functions lower-case() and upper-case() only use simple
	    case mappings (one's that don't change the string length).
	  </para>
	</listitem>
    </itemizedlist>
  </para>
  <para>
    See <link linkend="examples">Examples</link> for examples of how to use the library.
  </para>
  <section>
    <title>Invoking XSLT</title>
    <para>
      <itemizedlist>
	<listitem>
	  <para>
	    The first step involved in using the XSLT library, is to set the 
	    <ulink url="http://www.w3.org/TR/xslt20/#conformance">conformance</ulink> level.
	    At present, only Basic XSLT Processor is supported. In the future, we hope to add support 
	    for Schema-Aware XSLT Processor, so the first step is to inherit from
	    <classname>XM_XPATH_SHARED_CONFORMANCE</classname> and call <featurecall><featurename>conformance.set_basic_xslt_processor</featurename></featurecall>.
	  </para>
	</listitem>
	<listitem>
	  <para>
	    The next step is to configure the processor, by creating an
	    <link linkend="configuration"><classname>XM_XSLT_CONFIGURATION</classname></link>.
	  </para>
	</listitem>
	<listitem>
	  <para>
	    The next step is <link linkend="transformer">Creating a Transformer</link>.
	  </para>
	</listitem>
	<listitem>
	  <para>
	    The next step is <link linkend="transforming">Executing the Transformation</link>.
	  </para>
	</listitem>
	<listitem>
	  <para>
	    Finally, <link linkend="results">Accessing the Transformation Results</link>.
	  </para>
	</listitem>
      </itemizedlist>
    </para>
  </section>
  <section>
    <title>Customizable interfaces</title>
    <para>
      The following is a list of XSLT interfaces that the Eiffel programmer
      may need to implement. In all cases, the library provides at least one
      concrete implementation.
      <itemizedlist>
	<listitem>
	  <para>
	    <link linkend="output_resolver"><classname>XM_XSLT_OUTPUT_URI_RESOLVER</classname></link>
	  </para>
	</listitem>
	<listitem>
	  <para>
	    <link linkend="error_listener"><classname>XM_XSLT_ERROR_LISTENER</classname></link>
	  </para>
	</listitem>
	<listitem>
	  <para>
	    <link linkend="tracing"><classname>XM_XSLT_TRACE_LISTENER</classname></link>
	  </para>
	</listitem>
	<listitem>
	  <para>
	    <link linkend="transformation_result"><classname>XM_XSLT_TRANSFORMATION_RESULT</classname></link>
	  </para>
	</listitem>
	<listitem>
	  <para>
	    <link linkend="transformation_source"><classname>XM_XSLT_SOURCE</classname></link>
	  </para>
	</listitem>
	<listitem>
	  <para>
	    <classname>XM_XSLT_ENCODER_FACTORY</classname> is explained in <link linkend="configuration"><classname>XM_XSLT_CONFIGURATION</classname></link>.
	  </para>
	</listitem>
	<listitem>
	  <para>
	    <classname>XM_XSLT_MESSAGE_EMITTER_FACTORY</classname> is explained in <link linkend="configuration"><classname>XM_XSLT_CONFIGURATION</classname></link>.
	  </para>
	</listitem>
      </itemizedlist>
    </para>
  </section>
  <section>
    <title>Extensions</title>
    <para>
      XSLT and XPath provide for standard mechanisms to access extensions to the language.
      This library provides some built-in extensions in the namespace <uri>http://www.gobosoft.com/eiffel/gobo/gexslt/extension</uri>.
      In order to make use of them, you must provide a namespace declaration in your stylesheets, something like:
      <exmlsyntax>gexslt:xmlns="http://www.gobosoft.com/eiffel/gobo/gexslt/extension"</exmlsyntax>. Don't forget
      to exclude this namespace from your result documents with: <xslt>exclude-result-prefixes="gexslt"</xslt> when
      appropriate.
    </para>
    <para>
      You can also provide your own extensions. In this case, you should allocate a namespace URI that you control
      to your extensions. 
    </para>
    <para>
      In some cases (notably output extensions), the mechanism for accessing built-in extensions differs slightly 
      from that for user-written extensions. In these cases, I have incorporated example classes into the library so
      you can see how to code your own extensions. These examples are all in the namespace
      <uri>http://www.gobosoft.com/eiffel/gobo/gexslt/extension/example</uri>.
    </para>
    <para>
      <link linkend="output_extensions">Output extensions</link>
    </para>
    <para>
      <link linkend="../../gexslt/extension/index">Other extensions</link>
    </para>
  </section>
  <section>
    <title>Compiling programs which use the XSLT library</title>
    <para>
      To see which libraries need to be mounted in your system.xace file,
      take a look at the example program in <filename>${GOBO}/example/xml/xslt/schematron</filename>.
    </para>
  </section>
  <section>
   <title>Conformance</title>
   <para>See <link linkend="conformance">Conformance to standards</link></para>
  </section>
  <section>
    <title>Serializer</title>
    <para>
     For documentation on the serializer (which is a separate component for general XML serialization - that is, you do
     not have to use the XSLT engine to use it), see <link linkend="xslt_serializer">XSLT 2.0 serialization</link>.
    </para>
  </section>

</chapter>
