Re: Re: Assignment no, dynamic scoping si (was: Wishes

There is no question about side-effects and global variables in
the imperative programming style. I didn't ask for any of this
to be added to XSLT. What I was asking for was dynamic scoping,
at least an option to be able to use dynamic scoping for some
variables. I also said that without dynamic scoping I could see
little reason for calling variables variables, because they are
fixed value bindings that I could just simply lexically substitute
wherever they are used (except where an RTF is constructed.)

It should be possible to give a semblance of dynamic scoping by wrapping
your processor in a class which maintains access to and value of symbols
which the stylesheet references via an extension.  I should think.  I've
never done anything like this in practice.  What are the limitations to
such an approach?

There is even a simpler approach using only XSLT: I can make all
templates use an argument that is a constructed node-set
containing name-value pairs (the dynamic environment) and references
to the bindings in this environment would be supported by some
xpath selects in that environment node-set.

However, the problem with any of these things is that they are
either external additions or internal style rules none of which
work well in a larger distributed environment. I can write my
own systems to work that way, my own XSLT sheets to conform
with my styles but as soon as I collaborate with others, we get
into interoperability problems. That's why it is important to
have a few basic constructs in the language standard.

regards
-Gunther

--
Gunther Schadow, M.D., Ph.D.                    gschadow@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Medical Information Scientist      Regenstrief Institute for Health Care
Adjunct Assistant Professor        Indiana University School of Medicine
tel:1(317)630-7960                         http://aurora.regenstrief.org