Re: DOCBOOK-APPS: xrefs that simply give the number...

[Bob Stayton <bobs@caldera.com>]

> From: Jason Riedy <ejr@cs.berkeley.edu>
> 
> [Please cc me; I'm not on the list.  Thanks.]
> 
> Given the XSL stylesheets 1.40, is there a simple way to 
> have xrefs expand to the generated number (counter) of the 
> linkend?  I'm using Saxon 6.4.3, but that may not matter.
> 
> I can see how to modify the system's en.xml to do what I 
> want (change everything to %n).  But, as a mere user, I'd 
> have to completely install the stylesheets.  I'm hoping 
> there's a better way.  I've failed at tracing through the 
> templates.

Actually, you found the place where the templates for
automatic cross references are defined.  Changing the
template in that file would change it for your references,
but it would change *all* of them.
 
> What I _really_ want is a simple option on the xref toggling 
> text generation, but I can deal with always typing Section 
> or Table myself...  Is there another Docbook XML tag I should 
> be using?  

What you are looking for is a way to control the template
for a given <xref>, but that feature is not yet available
in DocBook..  I think that would be a useful feature in
situations where there are several references together.  I
suggest you file a feature request on the Docbook
sourceforge project Tracker page.

> There are some grammatical situations where I would prefer 
> the control, like generating such texts as "See Sections 1, 
> 5, and 7.2" or "As with operations (5)".  Some wordings may 
> be ill-advised, but I'm bound to reproduce them accurately.
> 
> On a somewhat related note:  Is there a way to xref 
> orderedlist listitems?  Again, I just want the number.

Currently <xref> won't generate the list item number
for an ordered list.  That could be another feature
request.  But a single-digit number is a very small
piece of hotlink text to click on.  Most of the
other xref templates add some words to describe the
linkend object, like Figure or Table.  In the case
of orderedlist, the item does not have a name, as it
could be any number of enumerated "things".
 
bobs
Bob Stayton                                 400 Encinal Street
Publications Architect                      Santa Cruz, CA  95060
Technical Publications                      voice: (831) 427-7796
Caldera International, Inc.                 fax:   (831) 429-1887
                                            email: bobs@caldera.com