Re: Saxon/Xalan extensions written by Norman Walsh for docbook-xsl

["Michael(tm) Smith" <smith@sideshowbarker.net>]

Daniel Leidert <daniel.leidert.spam@gmx.net>, 2007-03-01 00:28 +0100:

> Am Dienstag, den 27.02.2007, 15:28 +0100 schrieb Michael Koch:
> > On Tue, Feb 27, 2007 at 01:48:08PM +0100, Daniel Leidert wrote:
> 
> [docbook-xsl-java package for the Saxon/Xalan extensions?]
> > > In every case, I would appreciate your help. But if Michael Smith really
> > > offers splitting the source, I would prefer this way and put it into
> > > pkg-java (it's simple - the java guys probably have more knowledge about
> > > Java, saxon and xalan than I have - I have just some basic Java
> > > knowledge).
> > 
> > This makes only real sense when the java part has no dependency on a
> > special version of the non-java docbook-xsl.
> 
> That's IMO the case (Michael, your opinion?).

Sorry, but I don't know what's meant by "special version". But to
describe the relationship between the packages, a user who has the
docbook-xsl-java package installed also needs the standard
docbook-xsl package installed -- not any special version of the
package -- in order to make use of the extensions. Because the
extensions are called by stylesheets -- if a user enables certain
optional parameters.

Which reminds me: I would think that the docbook-xsl package
will need to have a requirement for docbook-xsl-java -- because
there is no way to tell at install time if a user plans to use the
optional extensions; the option to use the extensions is a user
run-time option.

> It's more like docbook-xsl depending on the extensions in
> special parts (e.g. the callouts-list handling).

Right.

> The code-base of the extensions also doesn't change very
> often: about 3 commits in 9 years (from what I can see).

Well, it's a little more often than that, actually. We actually
made a bug fix to them within the last two weeks. But it is true
that they don't change very often: would need only a couple of a
releases a year at most.

  --Mike

-- 
Michael(tm) Smith
http://people.w3.org/mike/