Re: What will be the future improvements of XSLT?

["Tangi Vass" <tangivass@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

David Carlisle wrote:
> > I think also that somebody who can manage HTML with a little JavaScript,
> > even given a small subset a XSL, will surely be puzzled by such a
> > declarative language.
>
> Why should this be?
>
> I find XSL far far less puzzling than javascript. Am I really weird?
>

By XSL I meant in fact XSLT only.

I'm not defending Javascript, which is surely not a model of smart language
but I think a single argument will be enough to proove that XSLT is
puzzling: a lot of people send mail to this mailing list to ask for XSL
solutions to very simple problems (the last one is 'sorting & styling' from
Olivier Corby).
I definitely can't believe all of them have brains so twisted by years of
procedural programming they aren't able anymore to learn such a <ironic>very
simple</ironic> language.

Despite, I'm agree with you to find XLST very practical to do simple tasks
(selecting, sorting, formatting, etc.).

Sebastian Rahtz wrote:
>A summary of XSL for Dummies takes 2 slides in a presentation,
>followed by (say) 6 more slides of examples.

I'm also agree with him but, as Michael Kay said, XSL is far too rich in
concepts for people accustomed to "HTML with CSS stylesheets and a little
JavaScript". The step in front of those who will want to stop being dummies
and do tricky things will be vertiginously abrupt.

It's indeed a pity that trying to do slightly more complicated things (just
try for instance to apply a template on any different value of an item that
can have sibblings with the same value) turns into a nightmare.

In fact, it's vain to debate about whichever language is the most puzzling:
- Non-programmers need to be able to do simple things easily so current
templates and non-mutable variables are nice ;
- Programmers will have more complicated needs so imposing pure declarative
style is sadistic !

That's all for this debate, as far as I'm concerned. The intention behind my
first posting wasn't to trigger a 'mine is the best' kind of argue.
By the way, I wish to thank Michael Kay, James Clark, and Oren Ben-Kiki for
their quick answers.

Tangi Vass


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