RE: [xsl] Using XML/XSLT for forms in .Net

[Pieter Reint Siegers Kort <pieter.siegers@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi Julian,

I got some, yes. Doing XML/XSLT in ASP.NET is straightforward and fast
(using XslTransform or the XML Web Server Control) but when it comes to
bringing in forms handling (on the server) it gets difficult. Why? Well,
forms handling in ASP.NET is usually done using the ASP.NET controls which
run on the server, and the code also. There is no XML/XSLT in between. You
can however use HTML controls that do not run on the server, and use
Javascript and DHTML to do the forms handling on the client browser. In that
case you cannot use the fairly extensive support ASP.NET has for forms
handling, and need to validate your script code on all target browsers. But
you can still build on your XML/XSLT base framework.

HTH,
<prs/>

-----Original Message-----
From: Julian Voelcker [mailto:asp@xxxxxxx] 
Sent: Friday, February 04, 2005 5:54 AM
To: xsl-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [xsl] Using XML/XSLT for forms in .Net

Does anyone here have any experience of working with XML/XSLT in .Net?

I have been working on a XML/XSL transformation HttpModule for 'skinning'
the output from my CMS and it seems to work fine rendering straight static
html from XML data and a series of XSL templates, but I have yet to get my
head around how to use it to render controls on forms and handle postbacks,
etc - in the past I have always handled forms separately from delivering
normal content.

I can handle the XSLT/XML side of things and transformations, something that
I have been doing for a while, although still learning the finer points of
XSLT.

At the moment all the content for a page in my CMS is generated as XML and
then linked to an XSLT and transformed by the HttpModule (similar to the old
xslisapi filter), which works fine for pages of static content.

What I am trying to understand is how to handle forms and postbacks whilst
still getting the templating benefits of the XSLT.  I know I could probably
hack things around using the XSLT to generate standard html form fields, but
would like to work out how to use the asp.net controls so that I can take
advantage of validation, etc.

It is probably a complete no brainer, but I cannot get my head around the
logical order of things.

Ultimately I would like to be able to put together a dynamic form that could
be configured via the CMS admin side of things to email collected data or
save to a database, but am a long way off from that.

Any thoughts/pointers would be appreciated.

--
Cheers,

Julian Voelcker
United Kingdom