Passing arguments to XSLT file

Norman_Graham

Dear all

A friend of mine has a simple content-creation system using XML/XSLT and ASP. The file litesite.xml is transformed to HTML by the file litesite.xsl. The transformation is set in motion by the file default.aspx. What the ASPX file does is pass arguments to the XSLT file so that the different pages in the website can be chosen and displayed. The whole thing looks like this: http://www.tanguay.info/litesite.

My friend and I would like to offer the same functionality in PHP for PHP users. So I've written/borrowed some PHP that looks like this:

<?php

/* litesite.php: transform litesite using PHP instead of ASP */


// set the filenames 
$xml_file = "litesite_php.xml"; 
$xslt_file = "litesite_php.xsl"; 

// convert the xml and xslt to a string 
$xml_string = join(' ', file($xml_file)); 
$xslt_string = join(' ', file($xslt_file)); 



$arguments = array("/xml" => $xml_string, "/xslt" => $xsl_string);


// Allocate a new XSLT processor
$xh = xslt_create();

// Process the document
$result = xslt_process($xh, "arg:/xml", "arg:/xslt", NULL, $arguments);
if ($result) {   

   print $result;   

}
else {
   print "Sorry, litesite_php.xml could not be transformed by litesite_php.xsl into";
   print "  the \$result variable. The reason for this is:<br />" . xslt_error($xh) . 
   print "<br />The error code for this error is:<&nbsp;>" . xslt_errno($xh);
   print "</p></span></body></html>";
}

xslt_free($xh);

?>

There are obviously some fundamental errors in this. The error message I get is this:

Warning: Sablotron error on line 1: unknown encoding '' in /home/www/einsweb/_md/scotreal.info/experiment/litesite.php on line 24

Sorry, litesite_php.xml could not be transformed by litesite_php.xsl into
The error code for this error is:< >69 the $result variable. The reason for this is:
unknown encoding ''1

My problem is that I am somewhat out of my depth - I don't really know much about XSLT and I find the PHP code that I've borrowed a little strange at points. I'm attaching the XML/XSLT files. If anyone would like to give me some hints as to what my basic error is, I'd be very grateful.

Thank you for your help

Norman

Norman_Graham

Well this one obviously didn't attract your interest - either that or you've started drinking already!

I've adjusted the code so that I now get no error message, but only the navigation bar appears (without links: http://www.experiment.scotreal.info/litesite.php) but the content doesn't. Here's the PHP, but could someone please help me understand how to pass arguments to the XSLT file?

<?php

/* litesite.php: transform litesite using PHP instead of ASP */


// set the filenames 
$xml_file = "litesite_php.xml"; 
$xslt_file = "litesite_php.xsl"; 

// convert the xml and xslt to a string 
$xml_string = join(' ', file($xml_file)); 
$xslt_string = join(' ', file($xslt_file)); 



$arguments = array("/_xml" => $xml_string, "/_xsl" => $xslt_string);


// Allocate a new XSLT processor
$xh = xslt_create();

// Process the document
$result = xslt_process($xh, "arg:/_xml", "arg:/_xsl", NULL, $arguments);
if ($result) {   

   print $result;   

}
else {
   print "<html xmlns:fo=\"http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Format\">\n<head>\n
<META http-equiv=\"Content-Type\" content=\"text/html\"
 charset=utf-8\">\n\n<style>\n.content {font-size:10pt;font-family:verdana;color:black}\n</style>\n</head>";
   print "<body><span class=\"content\">\n<br /><br /><p>";          

   print "Sorry, litesite_php.xml could not be transformed by litesite_php.xsl into";
   print "  the \$result variable. The reason for this is:<br />" . xslt_error($xh) . 
   print "<br />The error code for this error is:<&nbsp;>" . xslt_errno($xh);
   print "</p></span></body></html>";
}

xslt_free($xh);

?>

A happy New Year to you all

Norm 😃

Norman_Graham

Happy New Year everyone

Hope you all had a splendid time. I'm still tussling with my little problem. I've been googling for ages, but can't find an article which covers passing parameters to the XSL file.

Perhaps I should try and explain my problem a little more clearly.

I have an XML file and an XSLT file (see download in initial message). The XSLT file transforms the XML to HTML.
In the original set-up, an ASP file (default.aspx) ran the XML through the XSLT, producing a little webpage.
The ASP also passed a page parameter "p" to the XSLT file so that it picked up the appropriate section of the XML file.

I need to do what the ASP file did, but in PHP. I've got the XSLT/XML working together no problem (http://www.experiment.scotreal.info/litesite.php), but I haven't worked out how to pass that page parameter to the XSLT file so that it will show the appropriate content. It just show the navigation bar (with inactive links).

Any superbrains out there want to give me a hint? Weedpacket, Jayant, Cgraz ... ?

Thanks for your help

Norm

Norman_Graham

I'm obviously talking to myself here, but for the benefit of humankind, here's the solution:

<?php

/* litesite.php: transform litesite using PHP instead of ASP */

// Parameters for XSLT file

$page_choice = $_GET["p"];

if (isset($page_choice))
{
	$param = array("p" => "$page_choice");	
}

else
{
	$param = array("p" => "home");
}


// set the filenames 
$xml_file = "litesite_php.xml"; 
$xslt_file = "litesite_php.xsl"; 

// convert the xml and xslt to a string 
$xml_string = join(' ', file($xml_file)); 
$xslt_string = join(' ', file($xslt_file)); 



$arguments = array("/_xml" => $xml_string, "/_xsl" => $xslt_string);


// Allocate a new XSLT processor
$xh = xslt_create();

// Process the document
$result = xslt_process($xh, "arg:/_xml", "arg:/_xsl", NULL, $arguments, $param);
if ($result) {   

   print $result;   

}
else {
   print "Sorry, litesite_php.xml could not be transformed by litesite_php.xsl into";
   print "  the \$result variable. The reason for this is:<br />" . xslt_error($xh) . 
   print "<br />The error code for this error is:<&nbsp;>" . xslt_errno($xh);
}

xslt_free($xh);

?>

If you would like to make use of this simple and extendable CMS, the XML/XSL files are available at: http://www.experiment.scotreal.info/litesite.php

Norm