On 02/19/2013 08:01 AM, Kevin Michael Flynn wrote:
The following questions relate primarily to your XSL server product which I am
currently evaluating, but also to the underlying ditac functionality.
1 I need to generate a variant of the webhelp output in which the search tab is
suppressed (because search will be provided by an external solr app). I see
that this can be achieved by simply removing a div from the XHTML template on
which the pages are based. Is this the best way to do it? is there any built in
support for multiple page templates, or will I have to rename the file between
jobs in some way?
2 I also need to be able to produce (for each variant webhelp "manual"), a
single XML file containing indexable text extracted from all the input DITA files. I
cannot see an obvious way to do this as part of the webhelp generation job - I believe it
will be necessary to create a completely separate job in which ditac chunking is switched
off. Is that true?
3 Finally, for any given manual, I will want to generate a number of different
outputs: PDF, webhelp, the variant webhelp mentioned above, and possibly the
additional XML index file. Is the dita -> ditac conversion repeated for each
output, or is there a way to save and re-use it for each output?
XMLmind XSL Server is a *high-level* *shrink-wrapped* *product* which is
intended to be used without no further customizations than XSL
stylesheet ones (i.e. customized XSL stylesheets, or more simply
specific XSL stylesheet parameters).
Everything you want can be achieved by embedding XMLmind DITA Converter
(ditac for short) in a custom ``server'' of yours.
Note that ditac has been designed to be used, not only as a command-line
tool, but also as a Java software component. See:
Part III. Embedding XMLmind DITA Converter in a Java™ application
http://www.xmlmind.com/ditac/_distrib/doc/manual/manual-7.html
Therefore my friendly advice would be:
* Forget about XMLmind XSL Server.
* Hire a Java developer to embedded ditac in a custom servlet.
* Do the XSL/HTML/JavaScript customizations yourself, as you are
yourself an XML expert.
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PS: FYI, the Web help function of XMLmind DITA Converter (ditac for
short) is implemented by the means of XMLmind Web Help Compiler (whc for
short), another free, open source, well documented, well tested, component:
http://www.xmlmind.com/whc.shtml
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