1 Introduction
2 ------------
3
4 XSLTools is a collection of modules and packages facilitating the development
5 of applications based on XML, XSL stylesheets and transformations, notably Web
6 applications involving complicated Web forms potentially consisting of
7 editable hierarchical structures and potentially involving "live" or "in-page"
8 dynamic updates to portions of those Web forms.
9
10 Quick Start
11 -----------
12
13 Try running the demo:
14
15 python tools/demo.py
16
17 An introductory guide to creating applications can be found in the docs
18 directory - see docs/index.html for the start page.
19
20 Contact, Copyright and Licence Information
21 ------------------------------------------
22
23 The current Web page for XSLTools at the time of release is:
24
25 http://www.boddie.org.uk/python/XSLTools.html
26
27 Copyright and licence information can be found in the docs directory - see
28 docs/COPYING.txt, docs/LICENCE.txt and docs/LICENCE-Sarissa.txt for more
29 information.
30
31 Dependencies
32 ------------
33
34 XSLTools has the following basic dependencies:
35
36 Package Release Information
37 ------- -------------------
38
39 libxml2dom 0.3.3 (0.3.6 recommended)
40 libxml2 Tested with 2.6.17
41 libxslt Tested with 1.1.12
42
43 The example Web applications require WebStack (release 1.2.1 or later).
44 The example PyQt applications have been tested with PyQt 3.15.
45
46 New in XSLTools 0.4.3 (Changes since XSLTools 0.4.2)
47 ----------------------------------------------------
48
49 * Fixed translation selection when an unsupported locale is specified,
50 choosing the first locale as the default (rather than exposing the values
51 themselves as translations).
52
53 New in XSLTools 0.4.2 (Changes since XSLTools 0.4.1)
54 ----------------------------------------------------
55
56 * Added a content type check in the XSLFormsResource class, permitting
57 non-form-based resources to access the raw request data, rather than have
58 the data processed unsuccessfully and consequently discarded.
59 * Added a script and a function to fix template namespaces after editing in
60 a careless editor.
61 * Changed libxml2mod and libxsltmod import details to try libxmlmods -
62 suggested by Lucian Wischik for libxml2dom.
63
64 New in XSLTools 0.4.1 (Changes since XSLTools 0.4)
65 --------------------------------------------------
66
67 * Made translations specified using the template:i18n annotation take
68 priority over template:value annotations.
69 * Added expression-based template:i18n annotations, and provided fallback
70 output for such translations based on the value of the evaluated
71 expression.
72
73 New in XSLTools 0.4 (Changes since XSLTools 0.3.1)
74 --------------------------------------------------
75
76 * Changed the preparation of templates to produce rule-based output
77 stylesheets, thus permitting recursive templates. This requires an extra
78 expr-prefix annotation to be used in certain kinds of templates.
79 * Added a recursive template example application.
80 * Changed fragment production to use original template documents instead of
81 output stylesheets.
82 * Changed the in_page_resources attribute to provide the output identifier,
83 thus changing the prepare_fragment method in Web resources so that only
84 the fragment identifier needs to be supplied.
85 * Added the XSLForms.Resources.WebResources.prepare_resources method for the
86 preparation of initialiser and output stylesheets before an application is
87 run.
88 * Changed selectors to not automatically create elements in the form data
89 document unless requested to do so. Introduced a Form.get_selector
90 method in XSLForms.Fields.
91 * Permitted the creation of hierarchies of elements in
92 XSLForms.Utils.add_elements.
93 * Introduced dynamic parameter evaluation for multiple-choice fields in
94 order to support sources of multiple-choice values which reside in the
95 form data document itself.
96 * Added the FixNamespace.xsl stylesheet to correct documents saved by HTML
97 editors which strip namespace prefixes.
98 * Fixed filesystem encoding issues in the Candidate example; fixed language
99 preference access in the Configurator and VerySimple examples.
100 * Changed the BaseHTTPRequestHandler version of the Candidate example to
101 store data in a subdirectory of the current working directory, thus
102 allowing the demonstration application to work after package installation.
103
104 New in XSLTools 0.3.1 (Changes since XSLTools 0.3)
105 --------------------------------------------------
106
107 * Fixed copyright and licensing information.
108
109 New in XSLTools 0.3 (Changes since XSLTools 0.2)
110 ------------------------------------------------
111
112 * Introduced copying of multiple-choice value element contents so that
113 option element labels can differ from the underlying values.
114 * Added internationalisation support, providing the template:i18n annotation
115 and the template:i18n extension function.
116 * Updated the documentation to cover the above new features.
117 * Fixed non-GET/POST request method handling in WebResources.
118 * Added the xslform_preparemacro.py script.
119 * Added an experimental template:range extension function.
120
121 New in XSLTools 0.2 (Changes since XSLTools 0.1)
122 ------------------------------------------------
123
124 * Made a new XSLTools package and moved XSLOutput into it.
125 * Improved serialisation of transformation results so that output options
126 are observed (in some cases, at least).
127 * Fixed stylesheet and reference document paths so that libxslt should not
128 now become confused by ambiguous relative paths.
129 * Added expression parameters to XSLOutput.Processor so that in-document
130 data can be used to, for example, initialise multiple-choice field values.
131 * Added input/initialiser support so that input documents can be tidied or
132 initialised using information from the template.
133 * Added template:init for use with template:element in XSLForms to control
134 element initialisation where necessary.
135 * Added special high-level "macro" attributes (eg. template:attribute-field)
136 which should make templates easier to write and maintain.
137 * Added template:if to XSLForms, providing conditional output of annotated
138 elements.
139 * Added set_document to XSLForms.Fields.Form.
140 * Added prepare_parameters to the XSLFormsResource class in the
141 XSLForms.Resources.WebResources module.
142 * Added element-path, url-encode and choice XSLForms extension functions.
143 * Improved Unicode support in the XSLForms extension functions.
144 * Changed in-page requests to contain proper POST data.
145 * Fixed checkbox and radiobutton value detection in XSLForms.js.
146 * Updated the code to work with WebStack 1.0 changes and adopted the
147 new-style WebStack demonstration mechanism.
148 * Added XMLCalendar and XMLTable (to the XSLTools package).
149 * Added a dictionary (or word lookup) example application.
150 * Added a job candidate profile (or CV editor) example application.
151 * Added a template attribute reference and an XSLFormsResource guide to the
152 documentation.
153 * Added Debian package support (specifically Ubuntu package support).
154 * Added missing COPYING.txt file.
155 * Renamed the scripts to avoid naming issues in system-wide installations.
156 * Added a PyQt example based on the system configurator example, with the
157 form prepared in Qt Designer. This example runs in PyQt and in a Web
158 environment without any changes to the application code. In-page updates
159 are currently not implemented in the Web version, however.
160
161 Notes on In-Page Update Functionality
162 -------------------------------------
163
164 Special note #1: Konqueror seems in certain cases to remember replaced form
165 content (when replaceChild is used to replace regions of the page which
166 include form elements). This causes the browser to believe that more form
167 fields exist on the page than actually do so, and subsequent form submissions
168 thus include the values of such removed fields. A special hack is in place to
169 disable form fields by changing their names, thus causing Konqueror to not
170 associate such fields with the real, active fields; this hack does not seem to
171 cause problems for Mozilla. This needs some investigation to determine in
172 exactly which circumstances the problem arises.
173
174 Special note #2: Konqueror also seems to crash if asked to find elements using
175 an empty 'id' attribute string. This needs some investigation to see if it
176 really is the getElementById call that causes the crash.
177
178 Special note #3: Konqueror's XMLHttpRequest seems to append null characters to
179 the end of field values. Attempting to prune them before the request is sent
180 fails with a function like the following:
181
182 function fixValue(fieldValue) {
183 if (fieldValue.length == 0) {
184 return fieldValue;
185 } else if (fieldValue[fieldValue.length - 1] == '\0') {
186 return fieldValue.substr(0, fieldValue.length - 1);
187 } else {
188 return fieldValue;
189 }
190 }
191
192 This may be because it is the entire message that is terminated with the null
193 character, and that this happens only upon sending the message. Consequently,
194 some frameworks (notably mod_python) do not support in-page functionality when
195 used from Konqueror.
196
197 Various browsers (eg. Mozilla/Firefox, Konqueror) will not allow the
198 XMLHttpRequest in-page updates to function unless the URL used in the
199 requestUpdate JavaScript function is compatible with the URL at which the
200 browser finds the application. Currently, relative URLs are in use to avoid
201 this issue of compatibility, but should an absolute URL be deduced using the
202 WebStack API and then used, it may be possible that the values returned by
203 that API do not match the actual addresses entered into the address bar of the
204 browser.
205
206 To check the behaviour of the applications, it is possible to view the
207 document source of the pages served by applications and to verify that the
208 URLs mentioned in the JavaScript function calls (to 'requestUpdate') either be
209 a relative link or involve a URL similar to that which appears in the
210 browser's address bar. In some environments, the use of 'localhost' addresses
211 often confuses the browser and server; one workaround is to use real host
212 names or addresses instead of 'localhost'.
213
214 Choosing an element-path:
215
216 When specifying the "context" of the in-page update, one must imagine which
217 element the template fragment should operate within. If the template:id
218 attribute marks a particular section, then the element-path should be a path
219 to the applicable context element for that section in the complete template
220 document. Note that if a template:element attribute appears on the same
221 element as the template:id attribute then the element-path should refer to the
222 element specified in the template:element attribute.
223
224 Choosing where to put template:attribute, template:id and id:
225
226 When specifying the extent of a template fragment, one must be sure not to put
227 the template:id attribute on the same element as a template:attribute
228 annotation; otherwise, the generated code will be improperly extracted as a
229 fragment producing two versions of the element - one for when the specified
230 attribute is present, and one for when it is not present. Generally,
231 template:id and id can be placed on the same node, however.
232
233 Stable element ordering and element-path:
234
235 Within the element-path, the numbering of the elements will start at 1.
236 Therefore it is vital to choose a region of the form data structure with the
237 element-path which is isolated from surrounding elements whose positions would
238 otherwise be dependent on a stable ordering of elements, and whose processing
239 would be disrupted if some new elements suddenly appeared claiming the same
240 positions in the document. For example:
241
242 <item value=""> .../item$1/value
243 <type value=""/> .../item$1/type$1/value
244 <comment value=""/> .../item$1/comment$2/value
245 </item>
246
247 In-page update...
248
249 <comment value=""/> .../item$1/comment$1/value
250
251 Notes on XSL
252 ------------
253
254 libxslt seems to be quite liberal on the definition of runtime parameters, in
255 that there is no apparent need to explicitly declare the corresponding global
256 variables in stylesheets. Whilst this is nice, we may eventually need to
257 detect such variables and add them in the preparation process.
258
259 Release Procedures
260 ------------------
261
262 Update the XSLTools/__init__.py and XSLForms/__init__.py __version__
263 attributes.
264 Change the version number and package filename/directory in the documentation.
265 Change code examples in the documentation if appropriate.
266 Update the release notes (see above).
267 Check the setup.py file and ensure that all package directories are mentioned.
268 Check the release information in the PKG-INFO file and in the package
269 changelog (and other files).
270 Tag, export.
271 Generate the example resources.
272 Generate the API documentation.
273 Remove generated .pyc files: rm `find . -name "*.pyc"`
274 Archive, upload.
275 Upload the introductory documentation.
276 Update PyPI, PythonInfo Wiki, Vaults of Parnassus entries.
277
278 Generating the Example Resources
279 --------------------------------
280
281 In order to prepare the example resources, the prepare_demo.py script must be
282 run as follows:
283
284 python tools/prepare_demo.py
285
286 This will ensure that all initialiser and output stylesheets are created and
287 are thus installed by packages.
288
289 Generating the API Documentation
290 --------------------------------
291
292 In order to prepare the API documentation, it is necessary to generate some
293 Web pages from the Python source code. For this, the epydoc application must
294 be available on your system. Then, inside the distribution directory, run the
295 apidocs.sh tool script as follows:
296
297 ./tools/apidocs.sh
298
299 Some warnings may be generated by the script, but the result should be a new
300 apidocs directory within the distribution directory.
301
302 Making Packages
303 ---------------
304
305 To make Debian-based packages:
306
307 1. Create new package directories under packages if necessary.
308 2. Make a symbolic link in the distribution's root directory to keep the
309 Debian tools happy:
310
311 ln -s packages/ubuntu-hoary/python2.4-xsltools/debian/
312
313 3. Run the package builder:
314
315 dpkg-buildpackage -rfakeroot
316
317 4. Locate and tidy up the packages in the parent directory of the
318 distribution's root directory.