Learning:
The Journey of a Lifetime
A Cloud Chamber of the Mind

April 2006 Technology Notebook

Notes based on the W3C tutorial web pages for XML

• Although it is possible to display an XML using CSS, this is not recommended. Instead one should use XSL.

This was a bit of an eye-opener. Perhaps I should stick with Stylus Studio and Altova's Stylevision. I still see a major difference between the essential concepts of XML and XSLT and learning to use the software to accomplish the goal.

I feel that I understand the basic ideas of XML, but am not yet confident about stylesheets. Nor am I sure how to link the various files together.

Suppose I have an XML file containing data (e.g. books, Australian birds, CDs). Suppose I have also created an XSL file that describes the display information. Then all I need do to link the two together is insert the line

<?xml-stylesheet type="text/xsl" href="name_of_xslfile.xsl"?>

as the second line of the XML file.            

That is my missing link!

Now to learn a bit about creating an XSL file.

• XSL stands for Extensible Stylesheet Language
• XSLT stands for XSL Transformations
• One uses XSLT to transform an XML file into another XML file, called an XHTML file.
• XSLT uses a language called XPath to find elements in the source file and then it transforms these elements into an appropriate result form such at XHTML

Here are the basic steps.

1. Create an XML data file.
2. Create an XSL Stylesheet file
3. Insert a line into the XML file linking the stylesheet file to the XML file
4. View this file in a browser.

This is what I have been waiting for! I now have a clear idea of what I am trying to do.

Now to learn more about XSL and XSLT.