XSL Tools Proposal

XSL Tools is a proposed open source component under the Eclipse WTP Source Editing subproject.

This component proposal is similar to a Project Proposal (as defined in the Eclipse Development Process document) and is written to declare its intent and scope. This proposal is written to solicit additional participation and input from the Eclipse community.

Comments can be made in bug 206826.

Background

Eclipse is one of the worlds most popular and ubiquitous IDEs. It is well known for its Java and C development tools, and there are many plugins available from Eclipse that provide support for tasks as diverse as web development, database development, design and issue tracking.

However, while it supports XML, Eclipse is not thought of as a fully-fledged XML IDE. Eclipse's support for XML is provided by the Web Tools Platform (WTP) project. The primary purpose of that project is to provide a set of common tools for web technologies; it does not attempt to provide a complete XML development environment. Nonetheless, the foundations laid down by WTP are excellent, and include XML, DTD and Schema source editors, an XML catalog and Schema validation.

In order for Eclipse to become a fully-fledged XML IDE, a significant amount of functionality needs to be added on top of the core WTP modules. Particularly important is support for XSLT - authoring and editing XSL stylesheets, and running and debugging XSL transforms. Currently Eclipse supports none of this functionality, and this has led many XML authors to shun Eclipse in favour of more complete offerings from other vendors.

This proposal seeks to redress the balance by building one of the key components needed to put Eclipse on the path to becoming a fully-fledged XML IDE.

Scope

The goal of XSL Tools is to provide Eclipse with first-class support for XSLT.

This will be achieved by augmenting WTP with support for XSLT editing, running and debugging.

Proposal

XSL Tools will achieve its aims by making the following contributions to WTP:

XSL Editing

• an XSL editor with support for code completion and hyperlinks to XSL templates
• a 'New' wizard for XSL files that has the ability to create stylesheets from code templates
• a 'New' wizard for XSL projects that creates projects with an XSL nature and an optional Java nature
• a builder for XSL projects that validates stylesheets and creates error or warning markers on source files
• contributions to the XML preference pages specific to XSLT (e.g. syntax highlighting and code templates)

XSL Transformation Launching

• a launcher for XSL transformations that supports run, debug and profile modes
• ability to set up a pipeline of XSL transformations
• user-defined classpath for the transformation
• extension points to allow any type of XSLT processor to be launched (e.g. Xalan, Saxon, or whatever the JRE is configured with)
• XSLT processor specific features and output properties
• extension points to allow specific versions of an XSLT processor (such as Xalan 2.4.0) to be contributed
• preference pages to allow users to contribute specific versions of an XSLT processor directly
• console line trackers that link to the source document

Contributions

Initial contributions will be made from the open-source X-Assist and EclipseXSLT Sourceforge projects. The authors and IP owners of the two projects are both committers for this new project.

Contributions to the XSL Tools component will be made under the org.eclipse.wst.xsl namespace.

Tentative Plan

Initial Eclipse.org presence in Oct 2007

• set up incubator at Eclipse
• website
• CVS repository, seeded with source code from current contributions
• Bugzilla repository

Initial committers

The initial committers will focus on converting and integrating the two original Sourceforge contributions. Our agile development process will follow eclipse.org's standards for openness and transparency.

Component Lead/Committer

• Doug Satchwell
  Doug is a senior software developer and owner of the popular open-source Eclipse projects X-Assist and ShellEd. He has a great deal of experience developing Eclipse-based software, including source editors, GEF editors and RCP applications.

Committers

• Lars Gersmann - Orangevolt
  Lars is the owner of the popular open-source EclipseXSLT project.
• David Williams - IBM
  David is current WTP PMC Lead, but previously was one of the lead developers for the XML Source Editor in WTP.
• David Carver
  David Carver is an XML Data Architect for Standards in Technology in Automotive Retail (STAR). STAR defines XML business to business standards for use in the Automotive, Powersports, Marine, and Heavy Duty Truck retail industry.
• Jesper Steen Møller
  Jesper is a committer for the open-source Subclipse and EclipseXSLT projects. He is also the originator of the Mule IDE project and has contributed several bug fixes to WTP.

User community

The user community includes many current Eclipse WTP users, but may also attract new XML developers who will start using WTP for its enhanced XML, XPath and XSLT support.

Related Bugs

Links