Customer Reviews

Definitive XSLT and XPath

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Contrary to what book authors want you to believe, XSLT is not easy to use. Someone said it's "not fit for human consumption". And Adam Bosworth has said "This is the paradox: XML was chosen in part because humans could read and write it, unlike the highly efficient babel of binary formats that preceded it. Yet languages encoded as XML grammars and used for manipulating XML can only really be read and written by programs (and a few very smart people)."

G Ken Holman is a very smart person. He's written a book that is a very strong investigation of the theory behind XSLT and he works very hard to try to bend the mind of the reader to a new way of looking at processing XML. Many readers will be used to procedural text preprocessing, like I was, and this book sets itself apart from the rest with this very authoritative and thorough background. Ken frequently addresses higher-level concepts like how to manage stylesheets and how they fit in context with other XML and web technologies. Dont' get stuck trying to use XSLT for something it wasn't designed for!

I looked at 5 other XSLT books and in this one the examples were more varied and re-world and explained in more detail. But a million examples will do no good if you make one modification, it breaks and you don't know why. This book's primary contribution is answering the 'why'.

I didn't have to play with xslt for long to realize that you can get stuck for a long time on a tiny little bug that isn't evident unless you have a full explanation of the standard. XSLT and XPath syntax drives me crazy and it can be very hard to 'see' what is going to happen when the transform is run. There's probably no fix for that. This book is properly focused on trying to fill in the holes in your understanding so you can code effectively.

Definitive XSLT and XPath covers XSLT in great detail, but without losing the reader. It has a unique outline style (many nested lists) throughout much of the book, which takes some getting used to but turnes out to be a very efficient way of presenting information. This book works both as something you read "cover to cover" and as a complete and authoritative reference.

I've found this book invaluable in my work with XSLT.

Unfortunately, I didn't find Holman's "outline style" to aid that much in comprehension. At best, it would disjoint me a bit, and at worst, I wouldn't be able pull the different fragments of ideas together. Once I had a foothold in the material or knew the context of the language that I was looking for, the book's outline would make sense, but rarely beforehand.

If you are looking for a reference, I would say this book could come in handy and be useful, but I may consider seeing if better options are available. If you are looking for a primer, I'd steer clear of this text, or I would look for a preliminary introduction online before cracking it open.

Not much to add to what others have already said. I just wanted to respond and give 5 stars.

The examples are clear and definitive - if you have the ability to read XML and understand programming logic. Though Holman makes a clear point that XSLT is not a traditional programming language - but he does an excellent job of distinguishing the what, why and how of making the transition.

If you are looing for a book to learn about XPATH and XLT. Stop!! This is the worng book. The author does not express himself in layman terms. Instead, I think that one would have to be fairly familar with the technologies that the author is trying to explain to really appreciate this book.