Re: Formal parameters for stylesheets

[Paul Prescod <paul@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Jason Diamond wrote:
> 
> A processor could actually support parameters without changing the spec. If a
> user did something like this on the command line:
> 
> xt -Dfoo=bar test.xml test.xsl

Paul Prescod wrote:
> The only one that is not gross is overriding the value of a variable from
> outside. The problem with that mechanism is that there is no way that a
> GUI or command line tool can know which variables are supposed to be
> overriden and which ones are not. They just must "trust the user." It also
> means that a GUI cannot *prompt* for the appropriate paramaters.

I should have said "constant" instead of "variable" but otherwise I think
that this paragraph addresses your proposal.

Maybe not: one could interpret what you said as "any constants that are
referred to but not defined are implicitly formal parameters." I could buy
this but I think the spec. would have to be changed to say that it is
legal to refer to parameters that are not defined. I would rather if there
was just a first-class parameter feature.

 Paul Prescod  - ISOGEN Consulting Engineer speaking for only himself
 http://itrc.uwaterloo.ca/~papresco

"Remember, Ginger Rogers did everything that Fred Astaire did,
but she did it backwards and in high heels."
                                               --Faith Whittlesey


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