ProductsStyleVisionXSLT for RTF

Altova StyleVision® 2008 simplifies the creation of XSLT 1.0 / 2.0 stylesheets for transforming XML and database data into RTF pages.

The unique StyleVision design interface allows you to visually design stylesheets to produce RTF output from XML or database data quickly and easily. That same design simultaneously produces an Authentic form, as well as HTML, PDF, and Word 2007 (OOXML) output and the associated stylesheets.

StyleVision autogenerates standards-conformant XSLT 1.0 stylesheets with XPath 1.0 expressions. It also includes complete implementations of the powerful new XSLT 2.0 and XPath 2.0 specifications from the W3C. These new versions include significant improvements and new features that improve code stability and reusability, as well as an impressive array of new functions and operators. In addition, XSLT 2.0 support in StyleVision is schema-aware. Schema-awareness provides additional mechanisms for error isolation, simplified debugging, and enhanced code performance. In all, XSLT 2.0 and XPath 2.0 allow you create stylesheets that are much more powerful and highly efficient.

To read more about the benefits of choosing XSLT 2.0 for your stylesheets, check out the XSLT 2.0 page in the Developer Portal.

In StyleVision, you can select whether you wish to use XSLT 1.0 or XSLT 2.0 for individual designs. Depending on your selection, the appropriate functionality will automatically be made available in the design interface, and transformations will be made with the corresponding XSLT processor (XSLT 1.0 or XSLT 2.0).

The unique StyleVision approach to stylesheet design makes creating presentation stylesheets easier and faster than ever before. The intuitive visual design process means you don’t need prior XSLT, XPath, or template coding experience to design stylesheets in StyleVision.

To begin creating a stylesheet, simply open an existing XML Schema, XML instance, DTD, or database in StyleVision, and the content model will appear in the Schema Sources entry helper. You can even connect to multiple XML and database schemas to incorporate data from multiple sources – such as an XML file and a database – in your design. When you select an element or attribute that you wish to see in your output and drag it from the Schema Sources window onto the design pane, StyleVision prompts you to specify how you would like the new node to be handled (for example, as a new paragraph, image, table, etc.). This information will be rendered dynamically based on the data in your source(s). You can also insert static content such as header text, images, hyperlinks, and so on.

To add layout and styling information to your design, the StyleVision interface provides five advanced entry helper windows for viewing, editing, and assigning the style and layout properties of each element in your design. Learn more about this functionality on the Stylesheet Design page.

Because RTF documents are paginated, they require specific styling considerations. StyleVision includes special formatting options for RTF documents (the file format of Microsoft® Word versions 2003 and earlier), including cover page design options, page numbering, page count totals, headers and footers, margins, etc. These options are available in the Properties and Design Tree entry helper windows.

StyleVision supports advanced styling functionality for building RTF pages, including support for CSS styles. You can add precise visual styling rules to your designs using built-in CSS styles, and you can import your own CSS documents to leverage work you’ve already completed. Some CSS styles, such as those for combo-boxes and other HTML-specific components may not, by their nature, be applicable to paginated output. When such styles are used, a comment is displayed to indicate that a style may render a bit differently in your HTML and RTF output files. In these cases, the paged media will use a suitable print rendition of the effect.

StyleVision also allows you to specify output-dependent conditions when it's necessary to fine tune the output to different mediums, for instance to hyperlink text in HTML output but print the actual URL in the corresponding RTF file.

Stylesheets designed in StyleVision support advanced functionality such as conditional templates, auto-calculations, business logic validation, sorting data on output, and much more. Read more about advanced stylesheet functions.

The StyleVision visual, drag-and-drop design approach allows you to create standards-conformant XSLT 1.0/2.0 stylesheets and rich HTML output in minutes – a process that can take hours when performed manually. As you’re creating your design, the resulting XSLT 1.0 or 2.0 stylesheet is autogenerated along with the HTML output, both which can be viewed by clicking on the Preview HTML tab in the design window.

In addition to the stylesheet and output for RTF, StyleVision also simultaneously generates HTML, PDF, and Word 2007 (OOXML) output, plus the associated stylesheets, and an Authentic form. These stylesheets and output files are all generated based on the single design you create, and you can save the standards-conformant stylesheets and output files separately at any time.

The ability to produce all these stylesheets and output formats based on a single design makes StyleVision® 2008 the perfect tool for multi-channel publishing. Download a free trial now!