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/lgpl-3.0.txt, docs/gpl-3.0.txt,
29 docs/LICENCE-Sarissa-lgpl.txt and docs/LICENCE-Sarissa-gpl.txt for more
30 information.
31
32 Additional Software
33 -------------------
34
35 The XSLTools examples make use of sarissa.js from the Sarissa distribution,
36 release 0.9.8.1. Copies of this file are found in the Resources/scripts
37 directory within each example's package.
38
39 Dependencies
40 ------------
41
42 XSLTools has the following basic dependencies:
43
44 Packages Release Information
45 -------- -------------------
46
47 libxml2dom 0.5
48 libxml2 and libxslt Some combinations may not be reliable!
49 Tested with libxml2 2.6.17 and libxslt 1.1.12
50 Tested with libxml2 2.6.27 and libxslt 1.1.20
51 libxslt 1.1.17 should be avoided
52
53 The example Web applications require WebStack (release 1.3 or later).
54
55 New in XSLTools 0.6 (Changes since XSLTools 0.5)
56 ------------------------------------------------
57
58 * Added modular request handling methods to XSLFormsResource, altering some
59 of the examples to demonstrate the usage and overriding of these methods
60 in preference to overriding respond_to_form.
61 * Added methods to the Form class to support modular request handling.
62 * Added information about XSLT extension function usage to the advanced
63 template design document, linking to the housekeeping annotations section
64 of the template attribute reference guide.
65 * Observed changes in WebStack 1.3 and introduced default_charset usage in
66 the WebResources module.
67 * Added experimental OpenID support; improved the authentication resources
68 and mechanisms.
69 * Fixed the LoginResource to work correctly when detecting the protected
70 application's location.
71 * NOTE: Need to add persistence for OpenID associations.
72 * Added XInclude support in templates (requires libxml2dom 0.4.6 or later).
73 * Removed PyQt support since the advantages of designing user interfaces for
74 the Web using Qt Designer are questionable.
75
76 New in XSLTools 0.5 (Changes since XSLTools 0.4.6)
77 --------------------------------------------------
78
79 * Renamed template:id to template:section in order to get around problems
80 and potential future problems with browsers (such as Konqueror 3.5.6)
81 which get confused loading documents with multiple id attributes, even if
82 only one is unprefixed. WARNING! This change is not backwards compatible.
83 * Added Ubuntu Feisty (7.04) package support.
84 * Tidied the documentation HTML.
85
86 New in XSLTools 0.4.6 (Changes since XSLTools 0.4.5)
87 ----------------------------------------------------
88
89 * Improved the Login module, enabling the VerySimpleWithLogin example for
90 various frameworks.
91 * Relicensed under the LGPL version 3 or later.
92 * Upgraded to Sarissa 0.9.7.8 (compatible with LGPL/GPL version 3), removing
93 a test around DOMParser so that Konqueror 3.4.0 is still supported.
94
95 New in XSLTools 0.4.5 (Changes since XSLTools 0.4.4)
96 ----------------------------------------------------
97
98 * Fixed the result of transformations in XSLOutput: proper document nodes
99 are now produced.
100 * Added an XSLForms.Resources.Login module which provides resources to
101 support login screens and redirects.
102 * Fixed newlines in the attributes created from fields in XSLForms: CR
103 characters are no longer included since this caused the doubling up of
104 newlines in Firefox.
105
106 New in XSLTools 0.4.4 (Changes since XSLTools 0.4.3)
107 ----------------------------------------------------
108
109 * Fixed translation selection for the template:i18n annotation attribute,
110 not just for the template:i18n extension function - more apologies for
111 resulting output changes!
112 * Improved the template fixing stylesheet and added some documentation for
113 the script and the related expr-prefix attribute.
114 * Introduced WebStack 1.2.2 EncodingSelector and encoding changes.
115 * Added docstring and return value for the write_month_to_document function
116 in XSLTools.XMLCalendar.
117
118 New in XSLTools 0.4.3 (Changes since XSLTools 0.4.2)
119 ----------------------------------------------------
120
121 * Fixed translation selection when an unsupported locale is specified,
122 choosing the first locale as the default (rather than exposing the values
123 themselves as translations). Note that this is an unfortunate and subtle
124 change which may affect application output - apologies are hereby offered!
125
126 New in XSLTools 0.4.2 (Changes since XSLTools 0.4.1)
127 ----------------------------------------------------
128
129 * Added a content type check in the XSLFormsResource class, permitting
130 non-form-based resources to access the raw request data, rather than have
131 the data processed unsuccessfully and consequently discarded.
132 * Added a script and a function to fix template namespaces after editing in
133 a careless editor.
134 * Changed libxml2mod and libxsltmod import details to try libxmlmods -
135 suggested by Lucian Wischik for libxml2dom.
136
137 New in XSLTools 0.4.1 (Changes since XSLTools 0.4)
138 --------------------------------------------------
139
140 * Made translations specified using the template:i18n annotation take
141 priority over template:value annotations.
142 * Added expression-based template:i18n annotations, and provided fallback
143 output for such translations based on the value of the evaluated
144 expression.
145
146 New in XSLTools 0.4 (Changes since XSLTools 0.3.1)
147 --------------------------------------------------
148
149 * Changed the preparation of templates to produce rule-based output
150 stylesheets, thus permitting recursive templates. This requires an extra
151 expr-prefix annotation to be used in certain kinds of templates.
152 * Added a recursive template example application.
153 * Changed fragment production to use original template documents instead of
154 output stylesheets.
155 * Changed the in_page_resources attribute to provide the output identifier,
156 thus changing the prepare_fragment method in Web resources so that only
157 the fragment identifier needs to be supplied.
158 * Added the XSLForms.Resources.WebResources.prepare_resources method for the
159 preparation of initialiser and output stylesheets before an application is
160 run.
161 * Changed selectors to not automatically create elements in the form data
162 document unless requested to do so. Introduced a Form.get_selector
163 method in XSLForms.Fields.
164 * Permitted the creation of hierarchies of elements in
165 XSLForms.Utils.add_elements.
166 * Introduced dynamic parameter evaluation for multiple-choice fields in
167 order to support sources of multiple-choice values which reside in the
168 form data document itself.
169 * Added the FixNamespace.xsl stylesheet to correct documents saved by HTML
170 editors which strip namespace prefixes.
171 * Fixed filesystem encoding issues in the Candidate example; fixed language
172 preference access in the Configurator and VerySimple examples.
173 * Changed the BaseHTTPRequestHandler version of the Candidate example to
174 store data in a subdirectory of the current working directory, thus
175 allowing the demonstration application to work after package installation.
176
177 New in XSLTools 0.3.1 (Changes since XSLTools 0.3)
178 --------------------------------------------------
179
180 * Fixed copyright and licensing information.
181
182 New in XSLTools 0.3 (Changes since XSLTools 0.2)
183 ------------------------------------------------
184
185 * Introduced copying of multiple-choice value element contents so that
186 option element labels can differ from the underlying values.
187 * Added internationalisation support, providing the template:i18n annotation
188 and the template:i18n extension function.
189 * Updated the documentation to cover the above new features.
190 * Fixed non-GET/POST request method handling in WebResources.
191 * Added the xslform_preparemacro.py script.
192 * Added an experimental template:range extension function.
193
194 New in XSLTools 0.2 (Changes since XSLTools 0.1)
195 ------------------------------------------------
196
197 * Made a new XSLTools package and moved XSLOutput into it.
198 * Improved serialisation of transformation results so that output options
199 are observed (in some cases, at least).
200 * Fixed stylesheet and reference document paths so that libxslt should not
201 now become confused by ambiguous relative paths.
202 * Added expression parameters to XSLOutput.Processor so that in-document
203 data can be used to, for example, initialise multiple-choice field values.
204 * Added input/initialiser support so that input documents can be tidied or
205 initialised using information from the template.
206 * Added template:init for use with template:element in XSLForms to control
207 element initialisation where necessary.
208 * Added special high-level "macro" attributes (eg. template:attribute-field)
209 which should make templates easier to write and maintain.
210 * Added template:if to XSLForms, providing conditional output of annotated
211 elements.
212 * Added set_document to XSLForms.Fields.Form.
213 * Added prepare_parameters to the XSLFormsResource class in the
214 XSLForms.Resources.WebResources module.
215 * Added element-path, url-encode and choice XSLForms extension functions.
216 * Improved Unicode support in the XSLForms extension functions.
217 * Changed in-page requests to contain proper POST data.
218 * Fixed checkbox and radiobutton value detection in XSLForms.js.
219 * Updated the code to work with WebStack 1.0 changes and adopted the
220 new-style WebStack demonstration mechanism.
221 * Added XMLCalendar and XMLTable (to the XSLTools package).
222 * Added a dictionary (or word lookup) example application.
223 * Added a job candidate profile (or CV editor) example application.
224 * Added a template attribute reference and an XSLFormsResource guide to the
225 documentation.
226 * Added Debian package support (specifically Ubuntu package support).
227 * Added missing COPYING.txt file.
228 * Renamed the scripts to avoid naming issues in system-wide installations.
229 * Added a PyQt example based on the system configurator example, with the
230 form prepared in Qt Designer. This example runs in PyQt and in a Web
231 environment without any changes to the application code. In-page updates
232 are currently not implemented in the Web version, however.
233
234 Notes on In-Page Update Functionality
235 -------------------------------------
236
237 Special note #1: Konqueror seems in certain cases to remember replaced form
238 content (when replaceChild is used to replace regions of the page which
239 include form elements). This causes the browser to believe that more form
240 fields exist on the page than actually do so, and subsequent form submissions
241 thus include the values of such removed fields. A special hack is in place to
242 disable form fields by changing their names, thus causing Konqueror to not
243 associate such fields with the real, active fields; this hack does not seem to
244 cause problems for Mozilla. This needs some investigation to determine in
245 exactly which circumstances the problem arises.
246
247 Special note #2: Konqueror also seems to crash if asked to find elements using
248 an empty 'id' attribute string. This needs some investigation to see if it
249 really is the getElementById call that causes the crash.
250
251 Special note #3: Konqueror's XMLHttpRequest seems to append null characters to
252 the end of field values. Attempting to prune them before the request is sent
253 fails with a function like the following:
254
255 function fixValue(fieldValue) {
256 if (fieldValue.length == 0) {
257 return fieldValue;
258 } else if (fieldValue[fieldValue.length - 1] == '\0') {
259 return fieldValue.substr(0, fieldValue.length - 1);
260 } else {
261 return fieldValue;
262 }
263 }
264
265 This may be because it is the entire message that is terminated with the null
266 character, and that this happens only upon sending the message. Consequently,
267 some frameworks (notably mod_python) do not support in-page functionality when
268 used from Konqueror.
269
270 Various browsers (eg. Mozilla/Firefox, Konqueror) will not allow the
271 XMLHttpRequest in-page updates to function unless the URL used in the
272 requestUpdate JavaScript function is compatible with the URL at which the
273 browser finds the application. Currently, relative URLs are in use to avoid
274 this issue of compatibility, but should an absolute URL be deduced using the
275 WebStack API and then used, it may be possible that the values returned by
276 that API do not match the actual addresses entered into the address bar of the
277 browser.
278
279 To check the behaviour of the applications, it is possible to view the
280 document source of the pages served by applications and to verify that the
281 URLs mentioned in the JavaScript function calls (to 'requestUpdate') either be
282 a relative link or involve a URL similar to that which appears in the
283 browser's address bar. In some environments, the use of 'localhost' addresses
284 often confuses the browser and server; one workaround is to use real host
285 names or addresses instead of 'localhost'.
286
287 Choosing an element-path:
288
289 When specifying the "context" of the in-page update, one must imagine which
290 element the template fragment should operate within. If the template:section
291 attribute marks a particular section, then the element-path should be a path
292 to the applicable context element for that section in the complete template
293 document. Note that if a template:element attribute appears on the same
294 element as the template:section attribute then the element-path should refer
295 to the element specified in the template:element attribute.
296
297 Choosing where to put template:attribute, template:section and id:
298
299 When specifying the extent of a template fragment, one must be sure not to put
300 the template:section attribute on the same element as a template:attribute
301 annotation; otherwise, the generated code will be improperly extracted as a
302 fragment producing two versions of the element - one for when the specified
303 attribute is present, and one for when it is not present. Generally,
304 template:section and id can be placed on the same node, however.
305
306 Stable element ordering and element-path:
307
308 Within the element-path, the numbering of the elements will start at 1.
309 Therefore it is vital to choose a region of the form data structure with the
310 element-path which is isolated from surrounding elements whose positions would
311 otherwise be dependent on a stable ordering of elements, and whose processing
312 would be disrupted if some new elements suddenly appeared claiming the same
313 positions in the document. For example:
314
315 <item value=""> .../item$1/value
316 <type value=""/> .../item$1/type$1/value
317 <comment value=""/> .../item$1/comment$2/value
318 </item>
319
320 In-page update...
321
322 <comment value=""/> .../item$1/comment$1/value
323
324 Notes on XSL
325 ------------
326
327 libxslt seems to be quite liberal on the definition of runtime parameters, in
328 that there is no apparent need to explicitly declare the corresponding global
329 variables in stylesheets. Whilst this is nice, we may eventually need to
330 detect such variables and add them in the preparation process.
331
332 Release Procedures
333 ------------------
334
335 Update the XSLTools/__init__.py and XSLForms/__init__.py __version__
336 attributes.
337 Change the version number and package filename/directory in the documentation.
338 Change code examples in the documentation if appropriate.
339 Update the release notes (see above).
340 Check the setup.py file and ensure that all package directories are mentioned.
341 Check the release information in the PKG-INFO file and in the package
342 changelog (and other files).
343 Tag, export.
344 Generate the example resources.
345 Generate the API documentation.
346 Remove generated .pyc files: find . -name "*.pyc" | xargs rm
347 Archive, upload.
348 Upload the introductory documentation.
349 Update PyPI, PythonInfo Wiki, Vaults of Parnassus entries.
350
351 Generating the Example Resources
352 --------------------------------
353
354 In order to prepare the example resources, the prepare_demo.py script must be
355 run as follows:
356
357 python tools/prepare_demo.py
358
359 This will ensure that all initialiser and output stylesheets are created and
360 are thus installed by packages.
361
362 Generating the API Documentation
363 --------------------------------
364
365 In order to prepare the API documentation, it is necessary to generate some
366 Web pages from the Python source code. For this, the epydoc application must
367 be available on your system. Then, inside the distribution directory, run the
368 apidocs.sh tool script as follows:
369
370 ./tools/apidocs.sh
371
372 Some warnings may be generated by the script, but the result should be a new
373 apidocs directory within the distribution directory.
374
375 Making Packages
376 ---------------
377
378 To make Debian-based packages:
379
380 1. Create new package directories under packages if necessary.
381 2. Make a symbolic link in the distribution's root directory to keep the
382 Debian tools happy. Try one of the following:
383
384 ln -s packages/ubuntu-hoary/python2.4-xsltools/debian/
385 ln -s packages/ubuntu-feisty/python-xsltools/debian/
386
387 3. Run the package builder:
388
389 dpkg-buildpackage -rfakeroot
390
391 4. Locate and tidy up the packages in the parent directory of the
392 distribution's root directory.