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[xsl] UBL Formatting Specifications (Was: UCC.EAN xml schema to format object)

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At 2003-03-02 20:12 +0100, Eric Smith wrote:

Has anyone worked on converting the UCC.EAN xml schema
or ebXML schema to format object?

I'm assuming here you mean XSLT stylesheets to take ebXML instances to HTML for the web and XSL-FO for print. Yes, Crane Softwrights has publicly released a fledgling XSLT library for HTML and XSL-FO for the seven UBL document types (follow the "Resource Library" link from our home page linked in my trailer) under the modified BSD license so it can be freely used by only maintaining the original copyright.

The "schemas for ebXML" ... which are the payload e-commerce messages that are sent back and forth across ebXML ... are the purview of the UBL committee:

http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/ubl

In the last few weeks the UBL committee released candidate schemas (version 0.70) for a three-month review period:

http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/ubl/lcsc/0p70

Feedback instructions are on that page for anyone to comment on the work completed to date.

Alternatively does
anyone have an interest in becoming involved in a
project to create a "standard" XSLT library for this
purpose?

I don't think you'll ever see a "standard" XSLT library ... but I am pushing very hard for a technology-agnostic "standard set of formatting specifications" that could be (and have been by us) implemented in XSLT or in any other presentation technology. You can see the (very!) draft work at:

http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/ubl/lcsc/0p70/fs

All of the sample HTML and PDF files in this directory were created using Crane's UBL XSLT stylesheet library for HTML and XSL-FO. The UBL review download includes a frozen copy of Crane's library as of the start of the review period ... but we intend to keep our site copy up to date as changes are made (none yet, probably some coming up this week) and we may soon have something for XForms.

Ambrosoft Inc. is supporting this UBL effort by freely releasing executable JAR versions of Crane's stylesheet library.

A new subcommittee of UBL is in the process of being formed to develop these specifications as OASIS standards. Participation in the subcommittee is restricted to OASIS members, though the final work products are freely usable. Again, the specifications will be technology-agnostic and the committee will foster any and all implementations of the specifications in any technology by cataloguing known implementations for visitors to the subcommittee site.

If you are not already an OASIS member, I encourage you to join in order to become part of the subcommittee ... we would love to have your input! We are trying to create the initial slate of members right now.

I'm putting myself forward as the chair of the subcommittee (though I would welcome someone else to volunteer for chair as I'm supposed to be simplifying my life right now and resigning from committees) ... any OASIS members interested in participating are invited to contact me directly and I'll bring you up to speed with our preliminary status.

I sincerely hope there will be many and varied implementations of these formatting specifications ... I look forward to seeing your efforts!

......................... Ken

--
Upcoming hands-on in-depth XSLT/XPath and/or XSL-FO
                             North America:      June 16-20, 2003

G. Ken Holman                mailto:gkholman@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Crane Softwrights Ltd.         http://www.CraneSoftwrights.com/s/
Box 266, Kars, Ontario CANADA K0A-2E0   +1(613)489-0999 (F:-0995)
ISBN 0-13-065196-6                      Definitive XSLT and XPath
ISBN 0-13-140374-5                              Definitive XSL-FO
ISBN 1-894049-08-X  Practical Transformation Using XSLT and XPath
ISBN 1-894049-10-1              Practical Formatting Using XSL-FO
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