Re: XSL Standards?

Michael Kay wrote:
>
> The XSLT 1.1 working draft attempted to define standard mechanisms (but
> mechanisms which implementors were free to omit if they chose) for binding
> extension functions written in Java or JavaScript. The decision to give
> special treatment to two particular languages was unpopular with a number of
> users and implementors, and is likely to be dropped from the core XSLT 2.0
> specification, though my personal hope is that such bindings will eventually
> be standardised in other, separate, documents.
> 
Well, I objected to privileging any specific languages over XSLT itself.
I'd love to see a standardised binding mechanism but I am so frustrated
at not being able to come up with standard, portable libraries of XSLT
functions written in XSLT itself, as a solution to all the standard
questions that come up here. In fact I make a habit of not even thinking
about it, in order to avoid the feeling of depression the subject
normally triggers in me.

Learning XSLT is a serious investment for most procedural programmers -
it is rewarding too, but not nearly as rewarding as if the skill could
be leveraged to effectively extend the XSLT itself.

Mike, were there any real technical issues (eg that didn't apply to
writing extension functions in JScript or Java) to providing a standard
binding for writing extension functions in XSLT? Or was it something
else?

Francis.



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