Consider this:
<taskTransformer> <!-- as it's not just a for-each (name suggestions gratefully
accepted)-->
<elements row-elem-name="file"> <!-- this will become the xml source that will be
passed to the stylesheet -->
<fileSet .../>
</elements>
<taskStyle>
<!-- everything in here is treated as a template that would normally be defined as
<xsl:template match="/" -->
<xsl:for-each select="file">
<touch file="{ant:full-path(.)}"/> <!-- anticipating some ant specific
extensions. The example could use file="." -->
</xsl:for-each>
</taskStyle>
<templates>
... <!-- optional section if further templates are required -->
</templates>
</taskTransformer>
It's not a great deal different than each of us writing a scripted task when we want
to run over a set of files except:
- we can still use fileSets rather than relying on our scripting language's file
system access routines.
- any task could be used in a for-each mode without modification
- what is produced is used as though the fully transformed version had appeared in
the original build.xml
- the full power of xslt is available should it be needed. (and is there to bite you
...)
The task would assemble the included elements into a stylesheet that would import a
standard stylesheet (therefore any xsl:
directives in the build.xml would override the standards).
One nice thing about the xslt route is that xslt is already fully documented. :-)
There is enough work here that I won't just code it up, submit it, and see if it makes
it. If this seems viable to others and has a
chance of making it into official Ant I'll take on developing it though. (At which
time I guess further discussions would go on the
Ant-Developer's list)
***********************************************************
Brett Knights 250-338-3509 work
[EMAIL PROTECTED] 250-334-8309 home
***********************************************************
