Ok all you MacAttackers, this ones for you...

As many of you may know my buddy Russ Miles is a HUGE MacAttacker. When not writing code, books, or love poems to his fiance Kim I believe he spents his time writing similar poems to his Mac. Quite frankly if I was Kim I wouldnt put up with that kind of abuse but apparently shes a MacAttacker too so what can I say... :)

Elliotte Rusty Harold in a post on Monday showcased the new XMLLib osax processor for OS 10.2.8+ which, when you visit the site showcases:

Overview

The XMLLib osax is a Scripting Addition, i.e. a plug-in for AppleScript. XMLLib osax implements the XML DOM in AppleScript. Features offered by the XMLLib osax include:

* opening, validating, closing, saving a XML document
* browsing an XML tree - parents, children, siblings
* searching an XML tree - sending a XPATH request
* editing, creating, removing an XML node
* applying a XSLT stylesheet
* handling XLinks

Whenever this makes sense XMLLib carries references rather than explicit data, so your script will be able to process arbitrarily large XML documents virtually as fast as if you had been writing a C program - yet, in a more comfortable environment.

So, in other words you can now process client-side XSLT on the Mac via Applescript!!!! Here`s what Russ had to say on the matter:

"In fact I have been running into my own XML/XSLT woes recently as there is no XSLT processing in the current. No big worries for me normally but since Safari is built on Apple`s Webkit technology and so that can`t seem to take advantage of native XSLT javascripting which is a real pain. So, to overcome this I am wrapping a native code chunk which then links into Saxon - but oh my goodness is that a messy state. Apple intends to have javascript XSLT processing `at some point` but until it happens it`s a bit nasty. Thought you might be interested, if only as an annoying shortcoming in XSLT processing. I tried naively to use Sarissa within Safari to achieve client-side XSLT processing but, of course, if there`s NO support for XSLT in Safari that`s a completely different thing from providing a common API between Mozilla/IE ... would be terrific if Sarissa or something similar could bridge the gap for a javascript enabled true XSLT/DOM implementation - but maybe that is unrealistic within the constraints of the language and I should just wait for Safari to catch up."

Hey Emmanuil! Check this out: "..of course, if there`s NO support for XSLT in Safari that`s a completely different thing from providing a common API between Mozilla/IE ... would be terrific if Sarissa or something similar could bridge the gap for a javascript enabled true XSLT/DOM implementation - but maybe that is unrealistic within the constraints of the language and I should just wait for Safari to catch up." Whatcha think Can it be done I believe in you my friend!!! :D Seriously, if I can help please let me know as Russ so pointed brings out if it ain`t Safari it ain`t Mac, and theres no way its geting used on any regular basis, bottom line.

Hey, I just checked and you can pre-order Russ`s new AspectJ Cookbook from Amazon now! Congratulations Russ!!!