ANN: XML 2002 Paper Posted: Production Quality XSL-FO

This paper reflects the state of the world as of late October 2002.
Since I wrote it, the following FO implementations have been released or
announced:

- Adobe Document Server. Includes an FO-to-PDF component based on top of
Framemaker. Doesn't implement as many features as XEP or XSL Formatter,
but lets you use Frame-specific functionality from the FO, such as Frame
templates. Provides some extensions, including a revision bar mechanism.

- SUN's xmlroff open-source FO implementation. Written in C. Provides
internationalization features, including support for right-to-left
writing modes. Feature support is "almost basic conformance". Should be
released Real Soon Now (just waiting for final approvals).

- 3B2's to-be-named "free or almost-free" FO implementation, built on
top of the 3B2 formatting engine.

- Antenna House announced Unix and Linux support in 1Q2003 (they are
doing final release testing now).

- IBM's XFC FO implementation was released as part of a larger AFP
product. IBM assures me that it is under active development.

It was standing room only by the time I was done presenting my talk,
which is pretty good considering I was up against Norm Walsh. From the
questions I got asked, it was clear that a lot of enterprises are
starting to investigate the use of XSL-FO to do sophisticated page
composition.

Eliot
--
W. Eliot Kimber, eliot@xxxxxxxxxx
Consultant, ISOGEN International

1016 La Posada Dr., Suite 240
Austin, TX  78752 Phone: 512.656.4139