Re: Announce: Updated free SHOWTREE stylesheet resource

[Mike Brown <mike at skew dot org>]

> Now that there are XSLT processors that give access to the namespace axis, 
> it is past time for an update to this diagnostic resource.
> 
> SHOWTREE is a stylesheet that reveals an XSLT processor's node tree 
> interpretation of a source document.
> 
> As delivered, the stylesheet does not report any namespace information ... 
> to do so the file contains the instructions of which lines to remove.  When 
> used with these lines removed, namespace nodes are exposed.

FWIW, it should be noted that I haven't tested my SHOWTREE-inspired
Fancy XML Tree Viewer with anything but XT, so I'm sure it has the
same problems.
 
> Another change: the enumeration of child nodes no longer includes the 
> attached attribute nodes in the same count.  This was done in earlier 
> versions to reveal the order of "*|@*" but ended up being confusing to some 
> who thought the attribute nodes were considered child nodes.

I did the same kind of thing. Visually, I made attribute nodes look like
children. I've considered rewriting the stylesheet to address this, but
due to poor web browser implementations of nested tables, I'd rather try
something plain text-based, like SHOWTREE.

I'd really like to create the kind of ASCII art I've posted to the list.
For example,

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<foo xmlns="http://yournamespace" xmlns:myns="http://mynamespace">
<myns:bar baz="maz">my dog has fleas</myns:bar>
<myns:bar/>
</foo>

would become:

root
  |__element 'foo' from ns 'http://yournamespace'
       |  \__expanded-name 'foo'
       |  \__namespace 'myns'='http://mynamespace'
       |  \__namespace 'xml'='http://www.w3.org/XML/1998/namespace'
       |
       |__text '\n'
       |
       |__element 'bar' from ns 'http://mynamespace'
       |    |  \__expanded-name 'myns:bar'
       |    |  \__namespace 'myns'='http://mynamespace'
       |    |  \__namespace 'xml'='http://www.w3.org/XML/1998/namespace'
       |    |  \__attribute 'baz'='maz'
       |    |
       |    |__text 'my dog has fleas'
       |
       |__text '\n'
       |
       |__element 'bar'
       |       \__expanded-name 'myns:bar'
       |       \__namespace 'myns'='http://mynamespace'
       |       \__namespace 'xml'='http://www.w3.org/XML/1998/namespace'
       |
       |__text '\n'

I suspect, however, that the logic necessary to do this is beyond the
scope of an XSL transformation. Feel free to prove me wrong, though!

   - Mike
___________________________________________________________
Mike J. Brown, software engineer, Webb Interactive Services
XML/XSL stuff: http://www.skew.org/    http://www.webb.net/


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