IMHO several of the xml.apache.org packages have triggered grief w.r.t.
backwards compatibility. It's probably time to think about a different
infrastructure for XML->HTML conversions, although I would *really* like
to finish a Struts 1.0 release first.
Options to consider and/or think about for Struts docs (not exclusive,
just the one's I have heard about so far):
* Grin and bear it, and hope that Ant's <style> tag in 1.3 supports the
new Xalan and/or the Xalan that is part of JAXP-1.1ea2.
* The Anakia system used to create most of the Jakarta web site
(not XSLT based, but functionally similar to what we need it for).
* The "stylebook" system at xml.apache.org (undocumented, clunky,
essentially unsupported, but very functional for people who understand
it).
* External approaches like <http://www.docbook.org>.
If we go shopping for a new document creation technology, here's my wish
list in descending priority order:
* Based on open source and/or freely reusable technologies.
* XML -> XML transformations (to create the TLDs).
* XML -> HTML transformations (to create the documentation).
* XML -> PDF transformations (to create nice printable versions
of the documentation).
Every Jakarta subproject is facing the same sorts of decisions (in
particular, Tomcat needs to find a good solution for this), so it would
be worthwhile trying to coordinate if solutions can be found that
satisfy everyone's needs.
Craig
Dan Connelly wrote:
> Its a bit of a gotcha here on the Struts installation page,
> concerning the prerequisites for building from the (latest) source
> distribution:
>
> * Xalan XSLT Processor - If you are building Struts from the
> source distribution, you must download and install version
> 1_2_D01 (or later) of the Xalan XSLT processor (which also
> includes the Xerces XML parser). This processor is used to
> convert the Struts documentation from its internal XML-based
> format into the HTML that is presented in the Struts
> documentation application. [My red.]
>
> So, OK. Xalan version_1_2_D02 does work, and it is later than
> version_1_2_D01.
>
> But Xalan version_2_0_D07 does not work. I guess I was a bit foolish
> assuming that Xalan-Java 2.x is a later release of Xalan-Java 1.x.
> Yes, major number Revs are allowed to break backwards compatibility,
> so its entirely new and not strictly a later release of Xalan.
>
> But, it looks like Xalan-Java 1.x is now EOLed. All the action is on
> Xalan-Java 2.x. So having a dependency on an orphaned release is not
> too cool.
>
> I take it that the dependencies here are Struts <= Ant (optional.jar)
> <= Xalan.
>
> Which means (roughly) that if Ant (optional.jar) gets upgraded, then
> the Struts build.xml may need to be upgraded (??). At that point, the
> developers building Struts from source may need to upgrade both Ant
> and Xalan. Could this impact us as early as Struts 1.1, or can we
> just continue to use Ant 1.2 and Xalan-Java 1.x forever ??
>
> Just asking.
>
>
>
>
