Re: [xsl] Practicality of Separating Data from Presentation

[intelikon at email dot com]

James,

Thanks for the knowledgable response.
---------------------------------------------------------------
- XSLT is good for some things, some rather easy things become very
hard to
do in XSLT... XSLT is a very good partner to existing languages. In
addition, u can use XSLT as a preprocessor, auto generating ASP for
example.
This is where XSLT is a star in auto generating code for you.
---------------------------------------------------------------
My next question, James, would be, what is the best way (in your opinion) for auto-generating ASP?  Do you have any examples of ASP code being generated through an XSLT file?  Does it involve 'overloading' the XSLT file with ASP code - i.e. writing some ASP code within the XSLT file?  I have seen some code like the following:

<xsl:text disable-output-escaping="yes">&lt;</xsl:text>%= Now %<xsl:text disable-output-escaping="yes">&gt;</xsl:text>

as a way to create ASP code.  What would be some pro's and con's to this approach - assuming there are both?

TG


----- Original Message -----
From: "James Fuller" <james.fuller@o-idev.com>
Date: Mon, 1 Jul 2002 20:07:49 +0100
To: <xsl-list@lists.mulberrytech.com>
Subject: Re: [xsl] Practicality of Separating Data from Presentation


> Hello Tim,
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: <intelikon@email.com>
> > After reading Jeni Tennison's book 'XSLT & XPath On the Edge' I was most
> interested in Part III of the book.  I understood the concepts presented
> (reusing XML snippets, page templates, multiple stylesheets, etc.) but what
> I am vexed about is the 'placement' of ASP code - ASP conditionals , etc.  I
> came across an article on XML.com :
> http://www.xml.com/pub/a/2002/03/27/templatexslt.html - which in the third
> paragraph, the author says XSLT "fails miserably at separating these two
> layers (data & presentation)."  My question is, does the use of ASP bring
> conflict to the framework of using XML & XSLT to separate data from
> presentation?  And specifically do you see or practice the placement of ASP
> in the backend (in XML) or in the middle (in XSL/XSLT) or in the front
> (before the presentation)?
> 
> you will find that there are people out there that *gasp* hate XSLT for many
> reasons;
> 
> some qualifying statements that might help you in your quest for truth
> 
> - XQuery people think its a bit wimpy in real data situations, true but its
> simplicity means it gets adopted, even people who use XML have some problems
> with XSLT. The fact remains that XSLT solves most of XQueries use cases.
> 
> - SQL people say 'why' use xml and thusly xslt ; especially since the
> performance aspects outstrip anything at the moment, but my only retort to
> them is 'why are there not any SQL editors of worth out there'; analogy is
> powerful in learning and designers, developers and regular people generally
> 'get' html.... even if it presents mixed processing models and gray muddy
> water in serious data ( and data typing ) situations. The real issue here is
> that people have spent lots of time, money and energy in to learning RDBMS
> and SQL. What I dont get is that a serious architecture does not preclude
> the use of RDBMS, read up on some of Oracle's, IBM, M$ approach, all of whom
> have doped up their products with XML.
> 
> - XSLT is actually much better at integrating in a plethora of many
> languages( PERL, PHP, ColdFusion, Python, C, C++, Java etc), then the other
> way around, depends on if you put XML ( meta data and problem specific
> vocabularies ) and SOA at the center of your architecture instead of a
> language specific golden hammer approach to developing applications.
> 
> - it is true, if u don't design and plan your use of any language, then it
> could fail miserably at seperating data and presentation, but really this
> mantra is a rather old hack; yes there are powerful savings in time when
> seperating data and presentation, which is powerful in any computing context
> ( hey the mac doesnt even have a command line....or anything under their
> GUI, their operating system IS the GUI ! )...but there are much more
> compelling arguments to using xml and thusly xslt in  your architecture.
> 
> - XSLT is good for some things, some rather easy things become very hard to
> do in XSLT... XSLT is a very good partner to existing languages. In
> addition, u can use XSLT as a preprocessor, auto generating ASP for example.
> This is where XSLT is a star in auto generating code for you.
> 
> XSLT is simple and many existing editors can manipulate text based xml
> XSLT is supported in just about every major language
> XSLT is a good tactical data manipulation and querying language, albeit its
> more XPATH thats useful then XSLT when used as a data querying mechanism
> XSLT promotes templating and strong push and pull models of processing
> information
> XSLT in a world of xml vocabularies is needed as a tactical language to
> easily transform back and forth from ( ex. WSDL to SOAP call )
> XSLT brings in some well known computing algorithims to the majority of
> programmers ( think LISP )
> XSLT built into the browser and common client situations means we dont need
> a full blown database for manipulating data, just an xml file and XSLT
> processor
> 
> 
> I could keep on going, but maybe some other people who have more exp mixing
> the use of ASP and XSLT could pipe up, I would peruse www.topxml.com and
> possibly www.bayes.co.uk/xml to get some ideas of how people are doing it.
> 
> good luck, jim fuller
> 
> 
> 
>  XSL-List info and archive:  http://www.mulberrytech.com/xsl/xsl-list
> 
> 

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