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Generating Formatting Objects

You can use Stylus Studio to develop a stylesheet that generates XSL Formatting Objects (FO). In the scenario in which you apply such a stylesheet, you can specify that Stylus Studio should run a Formatting Objects Processor (FOP) on the stylesheet's result document. When you apply the stylesheet and preview the results, Stylus Studio displays the formatted results.

Stylus Studio includes The Apache Software Organization's FOP, and it is configured to always generate PDF. If you want to run a FOP to generate some other type of output, you must specify some other FOP in the Custom post-process fields of the Post-process tab of the Scenario Properties dialog box.

Stylus Studio includes two sample stylesheets that generate formatting objects. These files are in the examples\XSLFormattingObjects directory of your Stylus Studio installation directory.

This section covers the following topics:

Developing Stylesheets That Generate FO

Troubleshooting FOP Errors

Viewing the FO Sample Application

Deploying Stylesheets That Generate FO

Using Apache FOP to Generate NonPDF Output


Note		FO is a W3C recommendation for an XML vocabulary that describes how to format text. FO is one part of XSL. This section assumes that you are familiar with FO. For additional information about FO, see http://www.w3.org/TR/2001/REC-xsl-20011015/.

Developing Stylesheets That Generate FO


Tip		Initially, develop the stylesheet with Stylus Studio's internal XSLT processor. It gives better error messages than the Xalan-J processor. When the transformation and display appear to work with the built-in XSLT processor, try using the Xalan-J processor in Stylus Studio. The Xalan-J processor is the one that the FOP uses when you apply this stylesheet from a command line.

To develop a stylesheet that generates FO:

1. Define the scenario in which you want to apply the stylesheet that generates FO. See Creating a Scenario.

2. In the Scenario Properties dialog box, in the Post-process tab, do one of the following:

Select Postprocess with Apache FOP.

The Apache FOP included with Stylus Studio is configured to convert FO XML into PDF. Stylus Studio then uses Acrobat Reader to display the PDF in the Stylus Studio preview window.

Specify some other FOP in the Custom post-process fields. You must do this when you want to generate output other than PDF. If you want to use the Apache FOP included with Stylus Studio to generate a format other than PDF, you can do that here.

See Postprocessing Result Documents.

3. In the XSLT editor, define a stylesheet that generates FO. As soon as you type <fo:, Stylus Studio displays a completion menu of FO that you can select from.

4. Apply the stylesheet to an XML document.

After Stylus Studio transforms the XML document to generate a result XML document that contains formatting objects, Stylus Studio automatically runs the FOP you specified on the result document. Stylus Studio then displays the postprocess result in the XSLT Preview window.

Troubleshooting FOP Errors

If the transformation works well, but the FOP generates an error, obtain a copy of RenderX's Unofficial DTD for XSL Formatting Objects. You can find this at http://www.renderx.com. Although this DTD is not official (it is more limited than what the W3C XSL recommendation defines), it is a helpful debugging tool.

To validate the generated XML against this DTD:

1. Copy the DTD to a location such as C:\fo.dtd.

2. Include a document type declaration, such as the following, in your generated document:

<!DOCTYPE fo:root SYSTEM "/fo.dtd">

3. Turn off postprocessing.

4. Apply the stylesheet.

5. Save the resulting XML document.

6. Open the saved XML document in Stylus Studio.

7. Click Validate Document

Viewing the FO Sample Application

To view the FO sample application included with Stylus Studio:

1. In Stylus Studio, open the examples\XSLFormattingObjects\minimal-catalog.xsl file in your Stylus Studio installation directory.

Alternative: If the Stylus Studio examples project is open, you can access this file from the Project window. To open the examples project, open examples.prj in the Stylus Studio examples directory.

The video scenario has already been defined. In the Post-process tab of the Scenario Properties dialog box, Postprocess with Apache FOP is selected.

In this scenario, Stylus Studio selects elements to operate on from three different documents. These documents are in the examples directory of the Stylus Studio installation directory. They are also in the examples project. The documents are:

VideoCenter\videos.xml

simpleMappings\books.xml

simpleMappings\catalog.xml

2. Click Preview Result

. As you can see, the Output Window shows some postprocessing information messages.

Figure 212. Example of XSLT FO Processing

After a few seconds, the Preview window displays the PDF result in Acrobat Reader. The result contains a few lines of text for each video and book found in the XML source documents. The title, author or director, and the description is included for each item. It is hard to see where information for one item ends and another begins.

3. Examine the stylesheet. It contains the minimum FO instructions required to generate FO. There is no formatting to make the result document easier to read. You can use this stylesheet as a skeleton for creating your own stylesheets that generate FO.

4. Now open the examples\XSLFormattingObjects\catalog.xsl stylesheet.

5. Click Preview Result

Figure 213. Another Example of XSLT FO Processing

This time the PDF result in the Preview window is nicely formatted. The catalog.xsl stylesheet adds some basic formatting, as well as images, to the minimal-catalog.xsl stylesheet. Now it is easy to distinguish the title, author or director, and description for each video or book.

Deploying Stylesheets That Generate FO

When your stylesheet is complete, the process for creating a final document, such as a PDF document, from an XML document is as follows:

1. Apply a stylesheet to an XML document. This results in an XML document that contains XSL FO.

2. Run a FOP, such as Apache's FOP, and use the generated XML as input.

Example

You can accomplish both steps with a single invocation of FOP on the command line. For example:

java -cp "C:\Program 
Files\StylusStudio\bin\Plugins\Fop\fop.jar;C:\Program 
Files\StylusStudio\bin\xalan.jar" org.apache.fop.apps.Fop -xml 
..\VideoCenter\videos.xml -xsl catalog.xsl -pdf multimediacatalog.pdf

Replace C:\Program Files\StylusStudio with the name of the directory in which Stylus Studio is installed.

Using Apache FOP to Generate NonPDF Output

The Apache FOP included with Stylus Studio is configured to output PDF.

To use this FOP to generate some other type of output:

1. Open the stylesheet whose results you want to postprocess with the Apache FOP.

2. Create or open a scenario in which to do the postprocessing. See Creating a Scenario. Stylus Studio displays the Scenario Properties dialog box.

3. In the Scenario Properties dialog box, click the Post-process tab.

4. Select Custom post-process.

5. In the Command line field, enter something like the following:


java -cp "C:\Program Files\StylusStudio\bin\Plugins\Fop\fop.jar" org.apache.fop.apps.Fop -fo %1 -svg %2

Modify this sample command line according to where Stylus Studio is installed and what kind of output you want the FOP to generate. The last option, -svg in the example, can be any of the following:

Table 31. FOP Output Options
Setting	Output
`-mif`	MIF file
`-pcl`	PCL file
`-txt`	Text file
`-svg`	SVG slides file
`-at`	XML (representation of an area tree)
`-pdf`	PDF file

6. In the Generated file extension field, specify the extension that indicates the type of output you want. For example, specify .txt if you want the FOP to generate a text file.

7. If there is additional path information that the FOP will require to execute successfully, type it in the Additional path field.

8. Click OK.

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