Re: [docbook-apps] Abbreviation or aliases

[Michael Smith <smith at xml-doc dot org>]

Dave Pawson <davep@dpawson.co.uk> writes:

> On Thu, 2005-05-05 at 16:21 +0200, Jacques Foucry wrote:
> > Is it possible to use abbreviation or kind of aliases in docbook.

[...]

> Yes. If using xml
> 
> <!DOCTYPE book SYSTEM "path/to/dtd"[
> <!ENTITY ME2PP " Microsoft Excel 2005 for Palm Pilot">
> 
> ]>
> 
> later
> 
> <para>
> Working with &ME2PP; we do ......

It's also possible to use processing instructions as
pseudo-entities, like this:

  <article>
    <title>PI pseudo-entity test</title>
    <simpara>This is test of expanding a "ME2PP" pseudo-entity into
   "<?e ME2PP ?>" using XSLT. The example XSLT stylesheet imports the
   <filename>chunk.xsl</filename> driver from the <?e DBXSL ?> package,
   but you can have it import the <filename>docbook.xsl</filename>
   driver or some other driver instead. The XSLT stylesheet will output
   a warning about any pseudo-entity it doesn't recognize -- such as
   this one: <?e HOGE-MOGE ?></simpara>
  </article>

and then, to expand those pseudo-entities, process your doc
instances with an XSLT stylesheet like this:

  <xsl:stylesheet xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform"; version="1.0">
    <xsl:import href="http://docbook.sourceforge.net/release/xsl/current/html/chunk.xsl"/>
    <xsl:template match="processing-instruction('e')[normalize-space() = 'ME2PP']">
      <xsl:text>Microsoft Excel 2005 for Palm Pilot</xsl:text>
    </xsl:template>
    <xsl:template match="processing-instruction('e')[normalize-space() = 'DBXSL']">
      <xsl:text>DocBook XSL Stylesheets</xsl:text>
    </xsl:template>
    <xsl:template match="processing-instruction('e')">
      <xsl:message>Warning: Unrecognized pseudo-entity: <xsl:value-of
      select="normalize-space()"/></xsl:message> <xsl:text>[Unrecognized
      pseudo-entity: </xsl:text><xsl:value-of
      select="normalize-space()"/><xsl:text>]</xsl:text>
    </xsl:template>
  </xsl:stylesheet>

Yeah, I know it's a lot more verbose than using real entities.
But not wanting to have to put a doctype declaration/internal DTD
subset in every doc instance (don't otherwise need that if you use
RELAX NG-driven tools for authoring a validation), and lacking any
standard for the equivalent of entities in the post-DTD world,
I've not found any better way to do it.

  --Mike

-- 
Michael Smith
http://logopoeia.com/  http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/au/890

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