Re: [xsl] the problem with include and import

["G. Ken Holman" <gkholman at CraneSoftwrights dot com>]

At 2002-01-06 07:51 +0000, Matt G. wrote:
>It occurred to me, while I was considering the issues relating to 
>stylesheet library modularity with respect to dynamic scoping, that global 
>parameters and variables already present a problem (if I'm not mistaken).

I'm not sure what problems you are identifying.

>In my opinion, they ought to have been scoped to the file in which they're 
>specified.

You can choose to do this by namespace-qualifying your variable names, 
without changing the design of the language.

>I'm concerned that (assuming I'm not mistaken), if these issues aren't 
>addressed, it may be very difficult for stylesheet libraries of any 
>significant complexity to be developed and used, successfully.

I think you may be mistaken.

I've found the ability to declare a default value for a variable in a given 
module and then import that module overriding the initial value for that 
variable to be *very* powerful.

I've used namespace-qualified variable names in an imported stylesheet to 
ensure an importing stylesheet cannot "accidentally" declare a variable 
that would unintentionally override the variable used in the imported 
stylesheet.

>Furthermore, this would also provide more static optimization 
>opportunities to XSLT processors supporting some sort of evaluate() 
>function which supports variable references.

I don't think losing the implementation benefits would be worth it.

........................ Ken


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