Bertrand Delacretaz wrote:
That is, unless real good XML editors are widely available, but this is not the case today, IMHO programmers prefer writing structured ASCII than XML because of the tools available.
I disagree.
When you have to do stuff like
<xsl:if test="count(//whatever) > 3">
it's the time to realize there is something *dead* wrong with this syntax.
Right - but my vision of a "good" XML editor is one that would make this invisible - a tall order for sure.
Anyway, whatever the exact reason it's a fact that many of us prefer to write structured text than XML.
...And since the reason why xslt is XML is to allow auto-processing, but tell me: how many times did you have to write a stylesheet that processed a stylesheet?
I see your point - I cannot see an advantage today of having XSLT stylesheets written in XML.
...But the real question becomes: who's concern is to 'prepare' the data for the visualization? the view itself or the underlying controller?
I'm not sure there is a clear answer to that, but for sure not one that rules out the other.
This is indeed hard to answer.
Maybe an "allow extensions" switch at the top of the templatesheet would allow programmers to decide which way they want to go.
I don't think ruling out extensions forever is a good thing, but forcing people to explicitely turn them on might help as a warning.
...Yes. If done, the above would just be syntax sugar on top of XSLT. Potentially implementing on *part* of it but for sure without extending it or it would be impossible to transform it transparently to XSLT.
Cool.
...Also because I'm lazy and I want to reuse good machinery (XSLTC) when I see it :)
As we know lazyness is a virtue here ;-)
-Bertrand
