The open-source XML Authoring
Environment (XAE)
package for Emacs, developed by Paul
Kinnucan, who also created the Java Development
Environment for Emacs (JDE), aims to be an
"easy-to-install, integrated development environment for
creating, transforming, and displaying XML documents."
Kinnucan has said that in developing and maintaining the
package, he is "determined to have a single download that
will work 'out-of-the-box' without the user having to do
anything but adding the appropriate load-path and
require statements to their .emacs
files."
The XAE needs to be used in conjunction with an HTML
browser and currently offers integrated support only for DocBook
documents[1], but it is apparently
intended in part as a quick way for new users to get started
on authoring XML documents in Emacs. Users who already have
an Emacs XML editing environment set up
-- especially those that want the
convenience of integrated XSLT transform support and HTML
display -- may find it worthwhile as
well.
The XAE distribution installs the following software and
documentation:
It requires that you already have installed Java, Eric
Ludlam's
eieio
package, and either Emacs or XEmacs.
Though Emacs seems to be widely used in the XML
development community and is the editor of choice for many
open-source documentation projects, the transformation
support in current SGML/XML-authoring packages for Linux
-- for example,
task-sgml (Debian packages) and docbook-tools
(RPMs) -- is based on Jade and the DSSSL
stylesheets for DocBook, not on XSLT. And Windows users
have had no Emacs-based SGML/XML-authoring package/easy
installs available at all, though Markus Hoenicka's widely
used
tutorial does provide step-by-step instructions for
setting up a Windows authoring environment.
So the XAE appears be the only available Emacs-based XML
editing package with integrated XSLT installation and
transform support.
The XAE adds XSLT-related menus and commands to Emacs: a
View Document submenu gives access to commands for
displaying transformation results either in an XML-enabled
browser (using the browser's built-in XSLT engine) or in a
HTML-only browser (using Saxon to perform the XML-to-HTML
transform before sending it to the browser):
This display integration enables you to get back and forth
fairly quickly from viewing the rendered version as you
work on editing the XML source.
The Apply Stylesheet submenu enables you to choose any
type of available XSLT stylesheet (not just an
HTML-generating stylesheet) to apply to a document,
initiating an automated process that transforms the
document and then saves the transformation result as a file
(without displaying it).
A Help submenu provides access to HTML documentation
(the contents of DocBook: The Definitive Guide) for
the DTD being used.
An XAE New submenu provides an easy way to start an
editing session by choosing from one or more user- or
site-configurable templates.
I ran into a couple of problems getting the XAE working
in my environment, but was able to resolve them pretty
easily by:
-
changing the default PUBLIC identifier in the
templates to "-//OASIS//DTD DocBook XML
V4.1.2//EN" -- the
correct PUBLIC id for the version of DocBook packaged
with the XAE
-
adding a (require 'comint) statement
The XAE is beta software, so you may run into other
problems with it. There are no XAE-specific mailing lists yet, so if you have questions or bugs to report,
contact Paul Kinnucan
<pkinnucan@mediaone.net>
directly for help.