Re:RE: RE: XSLT vs JSP

[KAREN_LEICHEL@xxxxxxxx]

Thank you for the compliment! Tenacious is my middle name--well one of them
anyway!

It may be a less elegant way--I definitely agree--but with the Record function
of Word, and an almost complete version of VB attached, it certainly is easier.
I can write a macro in a minute or less to do things that would take me hours to
do otherwise. (I ran an experiment with this yesterday with myself doing the
macro and my best tagger using traditional tools. I had four times the files to
open, and I still beat him by an hour. He was not happy, and came away saying "I
must learn this.")

This is the only redeeming feature of Word as far as I can see!

Karey



____________________Reply Separator____________________
Subject:    RE: RE: XSLT vs JSP
Author: "Wilson; James.W" <James.W.Wilson@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date:       6/30/99 8:07 AM

don't get me wrong, the Word macros can definitely get stuff out the door. I
meant that comment as a tribute to the tenacity of editors who were willing
to suffer through Word macros (hardly an elegant transformation mechanism)
to make things work.

James

-----Original Message-----
From: KAREN_LEICHEL@xxxxxxxx [mailto:KAREN_LEICHEL@xxxxxxxx]
Sent: Tuesday, June 29, 1999 8:59 PM
To: Wilson; James.W; 'xsl-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx'
Subject: Re:RE: XSLT vs JSP


James,

Why would your company want to restrain the use of Word macros to format
SGML?
I have used them extensively and they have saved this project and others
quite a
few times. My online manual has almost 2000 files in it and the customer
frequently decides that the name of the manual ought to be changed--three
times
in the life of the project! Since two of these changes came within 3 months
of
the delivery date, there is no way I could have done it any other way. I
would
have set the name as a variable if I had known, but I didn't even know for
the
first two years that there was a possibility of it's changing. Other
nomenclature changes are also frequent.

I watch others here struggle with the absolute boredom of using Adept Editor
to
do the same thing in a lot more time and wonder. Word is a lot cheaper than
Adept Editor. Yes, there is potential for big errors, but at least the error
is
consistent and can be undone usually by another macro.

Take a look at my other e-mail for how I, as an editor/writer, think this
will
go. There will always be at least one writer in my tech pubs dept who will
be
capable of working with XSL. The question is will developers understand the
revolution going on in pubs departments that is leading to learning
programming
languages--ususally more than one--and tap into that segment?

 Karey Leichel

 
____________________Reply Separator____________________
Subject:    RE: XSLT vs JSP
Author: "Wilson; James.W" <James.W.Wilson@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date:       6/29/99 12:19 PM

I think XSL is well within the capabilities of some of the more technical
editors in my company, who often have to be restrained from using Word
macros and the like to format their SGML. (really. often the results look
pretty good, too.) they have the interest and the skills to make great use
of XSL - all the better since it's not a programming language
(Turing-completeness aside). 

aside from editors, the standards groups and designers will have a ball with
XSL. they already use home-grown 'rules files' to control output anyways, so
will make the transition pretty easily. perhaps in the future there'll still
be some developers available to help them code up the hard parts, or write
custom extensions for things that don't make sense in XSL.

James Wilson

-----Original Message-----
From: Chuck Robey [mailto:chuckr@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
Sent: Tuesday, June 29, 1999 12:57 PM
To: xsl-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: XSLT vs JSP


On Tue, 29 Jun 1999, Paul Prescod wrote:

> Chuck Robey wrote:
> > 
> > XML may have very important uses in the publishing field, depending.
> > Many publishers were hoping that SGML/DSSSL would be a useable common
> > format, but it turned out to be too complicated for editors to encompass
> > ... these folks are not programmers, so DSSSL could not address those
> > people for which it had ben invented.
> 
> I work with publishers alot and I don't know of *any* that consider
> XML/SGML stylesheet development (DSSSL or otherwise) to be the role of an
> *editor*.

But that was what it was intended to be, something that an editor could
use to design a document.  Editors do that, you know, I've known
several, they don't ask programmers to do that for them, at least until
DSSSL tried to force that.

That might sound like sarcasm above.  I didn't intend it to.

> 
> > I think XSL is at the edge of being too complicated, but on the right
> > side at the moment.  Don't let that part grow, add instead things like
> > JSP.
> 
> I think that XSL is well beyond the average end-user's abilities. Yes, it
> is a little easier than DSSSL and a lot easier than Javascript+DOM+XQL
> library. But it still isn't *easy*.

I think it's *quite* a bit easier than DSSSL, but I have to try to get
some editors opinions.

> 
> -- 
>  Paul Prescod  - ISOGEN Consulting Engineer speaking for only himself
>  http://itrc.uwaterloo.ca/~papresco
> 
> Those who profess to favor freedom and yet depreciate agitation, are men 
> who want crops without plowing up the ground. They want rain without 
> thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the roar of its many 
> waters. - Fredrick Douglass
>  http://www.informamerica.com/Articles/Quotes.htm
> 
> 
>  XSL-List info and archive:  http://www.mulberrytech.com/xsl/xsl-list
> 

----------------------------+-----------------------------------------------
Chuck Robey                 | Interests include any kind of voice or data 
chuckr@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx       | communications topic, C programming, and Unix.
213 Lakeside Drive Apt T-1  |
Greenbelt, MD 20770         | I run picnic and jaunt, both FreeBSD-current.
(301) 220-2114              | 
----------------------------+-----------------------------------------------





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