Re: [xsl] Future of XSL Stylesheet Writing?

Subject: Re: [xsl] Future of XSL Stylesheet Writing?
From: B Tommie Usdin <btusdin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Wed, 26 Sep 2007 20:50:56 -0400
At 5:15 PM -0700 9/26/07, Steven Janoff wrote:
Now I'm knee-deep in XSLT/XSL-FO stylesheet writing.  I've wondered how
long these skills would be "hot" before being replaced by
much-less-skilled workers using a WYSIWYG XSL editor to create
stylesheets, without knowledge of the underlying XSL code.  And I see
the recent announcement of the first such tool (or the first I've heard
of), primarily applied to visual FO development.


Actually, this is far from the first of these tools.

In my opinion (and without my having looked at the new RenderX tool) WYSIWYG tools for creating XSLT and/or XSL-FO tools have real utility, but will never replace experts writing by hand. Such tools are excellent at making easy things easier and moderately complex things available to unskilled users. However, they make complex things impossible and truly challenging things unthinkable. In environments where there are good WYSIWYG or drag-n-drop transformation mapping tools, "experts" are needed to do the complex things and to help users identify what is complex. (Also to sort out the mess when users use the tools inappropriately.) Experts are not needed for everything, but are certainly not unnecessary.

-- Tommie
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B. Tommie Usdin                        mailto:btusdin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
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