RE: [docbook] Is it possible to split chapters ?

["David Cramer" <dcramer@motive.com>]

> I mean validation in the sense of providing authoring assistance as you type. The problem with validating the parent-doc is that I can't simply click Go To
in the Validation Log when there is an error.

 

Yeah, that's another problem with XMetaL. With the authoring assistance on, you rarely end up with an invalid doc, but if you accidentially delete an element with an id you'd xrefed to, the feedback from validation is useless if you've broken your doc into entities. For that case, I have an "Open current document in emacs" macro that I use to open the parent doc in emacs (+ psgml mode), validate it and quickly find and fix the errors.

 

You should bring up all these issues up with XMetaL support.

 

> So far the solution I've come up with is to change the refentry element in docbook so that it allows multiple sect1 tags.
This is what I came up with for the declaration of refentry. Is this OK to do in docbook?

 

Ok, I think I'm beginning to understand what you want to do, but now I don't understand why. Technically, if you have file1.xml that contains:

 

<sect1>

<title>foo</title>

<para>foo</para>

</sect1>

<sect1>

<title>bar</title>

<para>bar</para>

</sect1>

 

The file is well formed xml and can be included into another file as an entity (I've also heard of the term 'well balanced' to distinguish between files that have a root element and those that don't). Most tools I've encountered handle pulling in a file that's not well balanced as an entity just fine. In fact, I just did an experiment and XMetaL also is ok with it. I created wrapper.xml which is a book and pulled in foo.xml with the following contents:

 

<section>
  <title>foo</title>
  <para>blah</para>
</section>
<section>
  <title>foo</title>
  <para>blah</para>
</section>

 

When I open wrapper.xml and double click on the foo.xml entity icon, it opens foo.xml and I get all the normal assistance while editing. You could hack it so you can add something that acts like a <div> around your sect1s and then have the processing system remove those, but why do you need to?

 

David

---

From: Kate.Wringe@ianywhere.com [mailto:Kate.Wringe@ianywhere.com]
Sent: Wednesday, January 30, 2008 2:30 PM
To: David Cramer
Cc: docbook@lists.oasis-open.org
Subject: RE: [docbook] Is it possible to split chapters ?

Hi David,

Thanks for responding!

 As you mention, XMetaL can only validate a wrapper file. To get around that, I added a macro (pasted below) that looks for a processing instruction in the format <?parent-doc parentdoc.xml?> in a document if it doesn't have a DOCTYPE statement, then opens parentdoc.xml if necessary, switches to it, and validates it. You put this in the On_Before_Document_Validate event macro and it fires whenever you validate a doc.

I mean validation in the sense of providing authoring assistance as you type. The problem with validating the parent-doc is that I can't simply click Go To
in the Validation Log when there is an error.

 
But that may not be the problem you're talking about (I'm not sure whether you mean validation in the strick sense or in the sense of providing authoring assistence as you type). Does largechapter.xml have a DOCTYPE (i.e. the DTD declaration at the top?) or is that in a book.xml that in turn contains largechapter.xml? A limitation of XMetaL's handling of entities is that if you include files more than one level deep, then you can't open the second level. So if you have this situation: book.xml includes largechapter.xml includes section.xml, then you can open book.xml, click on an entity to open largechapter.xml, do any editing you want there with XMetaL letting you know what's allowed where, but you can't open section.xml from largechapter.xml. This is really a misfeature/lack of functionality in xmetal.  We created a workaround for XMetaL's entities feature by using a script similar to the one you suggested below within the On_Application_Before_Document_Opens event.
 
A workaround that I can think of would be to make some fake wrapper.xml that includes both largechapter.xml and section.xml directly. The purpose of wrapper.xml would only be to keep xmetal happy and let you open section.xml in a way that will let xmetal associate it with it's dtd.

So far the solution I've come up with is to change the refentry element in docbook so that it allows multiple sect1 tags.
This is what I came up with for the declaration of refentry. Is this OK to do in docbook?
<!ELEMENT refentry %ho; (beginpage?,
                    (%ndxterm.class;)?,
                    refentryinfo?, refmeta?, (remark|%link.char.class;)?,
                    refnamediv?, refsynopsisdiv?, (sect1+|refsect1+|refsection+))
                %ubiq.inclusion;>


Thus we can create a chapter like the following:
bigfilechapter.xml
<chapter>
        <title> Title </title>
        <para>
        &file1; &file2;
       
</chapter>
file1.xml
<refentry>
        <sect1>
                sect 1 info
        </sect1>
        <sect1>
                sect 1 info
        </sect1>
</refentry>

file2.xml
<refentry>
        <sect1>
                sect 1 info
        </sect1>
        <sect1>
                sect 1 info
        </sect1>
</refentry>        

I've got to talk with the woman who looks after our XSLT build processes to see if
it is possible for her to strip out or ignore the refentry tags during the build process.
Otherwise, I'll have to insert and remove the refentry tags in xmetal.

Thanks again,
Kate

"David Cramer" <dcramer@motive.com>

01/30/2008 02:33 PM

To	<Kate.Wringe@ianywhere.com>, <docbook@lists.oasis-open.org>
cc
Subject	RE: [docbook]  Is it possible to split chapters ?

As you mention, XMetaL can only validate a wrapper file. To get around that, I added a macro (pasted below) that looks for a processing instruction in the format <?parent-doc parentdoc.xml?> in a document if it doesn't have a DOCTYPE statement, then opens parentdoc.xml if necessary, switches to it, and validates it. You put this in the On_Before_Document_Validate event macro and it fires whenever you validate a doc.
 
But that may not be the problem you're talking about (I'm not sure whether you mean validation in the strick sense or in the sense of providing authoring assistence as you type). Does largechapter.xml have a DOCTYPE (i.e. the DTD declaration at the top?) or is that in a book.xml that in turn contains largechapter.xml? A limitation of XMetaL's handling of entities is that if you include files more than one level deep, then you can't open the second level. So if you have this situation: book.xml includes largechapter.xml includes section.xml, then you can open book.xml, click on an entity to open largechapter.xml, do any editing you want there with XMetaL letting you know what's allowed where, but you can't open section.xml from largechapter.xml. This is really a misfeature/lack of functionality in xmetal.
 
A workaround that I can think of would be to make some fake wrapper.xml that includes both largechapter.xml and section.xml directly. The purpose of wrapper.xml would only be to keep xmetal happy and let you open section.xml in a way that will let xmetal associate it with it's dtd.
 
David
 
// From On_Before_Document_Validate
 
 if(ActiveDocument.doctype.systemId == ""){
 Application.StopValidation();
 
  var parentDoc = ActiveDocument.getNodesByXPath("//processing-instruction('parent-doc')");
 // Store the object representing
 // the active document
 var doc = Application.ActiveDocument;
 
 if(parentDoc.length != 0){
  try{
   var parentDocObj = Documents.item(ActiveDocument.Path + "\\" + parentDoc.item(0).nodeValue);
   parentDocObj.validate();
   if(parentDocObj.isValid){
    doc.Activate();
   }else{
    parentDocObj.Activate();
   }
  }catch(e){
   if(Application.FileExists(ActiveDocument.Path + "\\" + parentDoc.item(0).nodeValue)){
    var parentDocObj2 = Documents.Open(ActiveDocument.Path + "\\" + parentDoc.item(0).nodeValue);
    ActiveDocument.validate();
    if(ActiveDocument.isValid){
     doc.Activate();
    }
   }
  }
 }else{
  Application.Alert("Can't validate a document without a DOCTYPE or a <?parent-doc path-to-parent?>","Sorry");
 }
}

---

From: Kate.Wringe@ianywhere.com [mailto:Kate.Wringe@ianywhere.com]
Sent: Wednesday, January 30, 2008 10:58 AM
To: docbook@lists.oasis-open.org
Subject: [docbook] Is it possible to split chapters ?


Hello,

We are using  docbook 4.2 with our own customizations and our authoring tool is  XMetaL 5.0.

Currently we have a very large chapter, largechapter.xml,  that contains reference material.
This chapter is divided into  sect1s.  For various reasons, we'd like
to split up  the contents of largechapter.xml into three files/entities and insert the
entities into the largechapter.xml.

What we've done is created three files that contain a list of sect1s.
For example file1.xml 's hierarchy looks like the following:
<sect1>
       referenceA material
</sect1>
<sect1>
       referenceB material
</sect1>
...

We have no problem inserting an entity for file1.xml into largechapter.xml and validating
largechaper.xml. The problem is that we can't validate file1.xml on its own, because
it does not contain an over-arching root. As a result, it is difficult for us to edit
file1.xml.  Is there a tag that we could use that would fit within the chapter tag and would
accept sect1s? Or is there another way to do this?

I know that an easy solution would be to convert all the current sect1s in file1.xml
to sect2s and use one sect1. We'd prefer not to do this as it would add an
extra level for our users to drill down through.

Any suggestions welcome!

Thank you,
Kate