George Cristian Bina oXygenXML Play (43min) Download: FLV | MOV | Ogg | mp3

A live demo of oXygen presented by two of the oXygen team members. The demo will cover some of the important XML authoring and development features like:

• visual authoring (DocBook, DITA, etc.)
• schema development
• XSLT development and debugging
• working with XQuery and XML Databases

Questions are welcome at any time!

Priscilla Walmsley Datypic Play (35min) Download: FLV | MOV | Ogg | mp3

The FunctX XQuery/XSLT 2.0 function library is a set of reusable functions for XQuery 1.0 and XSLT 2.0. The project itself is an open source application and framework for developers to create function libraries. This talk will present an overview of FunctX from the perspectives of using the library and as an example of how one would build reusable XSLT and XQuery modules.

Jeni Tennison Jeni Tennison Consulting Play (34min) Download: FLV | MOV | Ogg | mp3

Test-driven development is one of the corner stones of Agile development, providing quick feedback about mistakes in code and freeing developers to refactor safe in the knowledge that any errors they introduce will be caught by the tests. There have been several test harnesses developed for XSLT, of which XSpec is one of the latest. XSpec draws inspiration from the behaviour-driven development framework for Ruby, called RSpec, and focuses on helping developers express the desired behaviour of their XSLT code. This talk will discuss the XSpec language, its implementation in XSLT 2.0, and experience with using XSpec on complex, large-scale projects.

Michael Kay Saxonica Play (60min) Download: FLV | MOV | Ogg | mp3

The XML Schema (XSD) specification from W3C is a paradox: it is one of the most heavily criticised specifications to come out of the organisation, but at the same time it has been widely adopted and implemented, and it can be said to have met all its design objectives.

For some time the responsible working group has been developing a new version, XSD 1.1, which is starting to get close to the finish line. Many of the difficulties with the specification (such as its immense complexity) will still be there, but some of the criticisms, notably those concerned with the limited functionality of the spec, are met head on with some powerful new features. This talk will give a quick overview of what’s new, while concentrating in particular on the way in which Assertions are likely to change the way in which XSD is used. Assertions, borrowed from Schematron, supplement the ability to define constraints using grammar and datatypes by a general predicate mechanism based on XPath. Already implemented in Saxon, they offer far more than the obvious ability to define boolean constraints: the talk will explain how they can be used as a powerful mechanism for tailoring and specializing schemas for use in different environments within an industry community.

The speaker, Dr Michael Kay, is founder of Saxonica Limited which develops the popular Saxon XSLT, XQuery, and XML Schema engine. He is a member of the W3C working groups for all three languages, and author of XSLT 2.0 Programmer’s Reference, the definitive Wrox guide to the language, recently republished in a fourth edition.

Mark Howe & Tony Graham Xcruciate Play (28min) Download: FLV | Mov | Ogg | mp3

XSLT is the canonical XML vocabulary for transforming XML, but the creators of realtime server applications such as chatrooms and virtual worlds have tended to rely on lower-level technologies such as SAX and DOM for manipulating XML client-server protocols. The goal of the open-source Xcruciate project is to develop a generic server solution based around XSLT, with I/O, data storage and application code in XML.

Theorists have discussed the extent to which XSLT is Turing-complete, with Dimitre Novatchev’s FXSL showing what is possible within a single transformation. The Xcruciate team has taken a less pure and more pragmatic approach, using a LibXSLT-based virtual machine to perform successive transformations on state data and to handle I/O to multiple clients via socket connections.

An all-XML server implementation offers a number of advantages compared to bespoke OOP code, notably by enabling snapshots of the entire environment through serialisation. The main challenge has been balancing the conceptual elegance of pure XSLT with the need for rapid throughput and relatively concise application code.

The talk will focus on the design decisions made in the course of Xcruciate’s development and the challenges encountered during implementation, as well as giving a taste of server application development within an all-XML environment.

Tony Graham Menteith Consulting Ltd Play (29min) Download: FLV | MOV | Ogg | mp3

Creating a working stylesheet may seem like an end in itself, but once it’s written you may want it to run faster or you may not be sure that the output is correct (And if you are sure, how sure are you?).

Profilers, unit test frameworks, and other tools of conventional programming are similarly available for XSLT but are not widely used. This presentation surveys the available tools for ensuring the quality of your XSLT.

There is no one-size-fits-all solution when looking for tools. For example, if you are using Saxon and Ant, then you are looking for a different set of tools than if you are using libXSLT and Makefiles.

This presentation covers XSLT-specific tools and techniques. It does not at this point propose to cover general XML tools and techniques such as schema validation or Schematron: they are of course useful, and could be added, but XSLT tools provide plenty to cover in a single timeslot.

Steve Peter Pragmatic Programmers Play (30min) Download: FLV | MOV | Ogg | mp3

In this talk, we present the toolchain used to produce the award-winning Pragmatic Bookshelf titles and examine some of the pleasures and pitfalls encountered using TeX, XML, XSLT, Ruby and other open technologies.

Jean-Michel Hufflen Besançon, France Play (34min) Download: FLV | MOV | mp3

This article focuses on the new features introduced by Version 2.0 of XSLT, the language of transformations used for XML texts. We show why these new features — groups of XML subtrees, functions, interface with schemas — ease the development of some applications. Some examples, related to bibliography management, will be demonstrated.