XSL to XSLT Converter (1/2) - exploring XML

XSL to XSLT Converter

Microsoft recently released an XSLT stylesheet that updates Internet Explorer 5 XSL stylesheets to XSLT-compliant stylesheets. The XSL to XSLT Converter Version 1.1 upgrade works with the July 2000 MSXML 3.0 Beta Release and enables you to take advantage of the new XSLT features included in the release. Note that this version does not work with previous Web releases of MSXML 3.0. You must use the July 2000 MSXML 3.0 Beta Release, also see column20 for a listing of the several XML component versions.

The Microsoft XML Technology Preview Parser maintains backward compatibility with Internet Explorer 5, and existing Internet Explorer 5 XSL stylesheets will continue to work. However, these stylesheets are not compliant with the final World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) XSLT Recommendation, starting with the fact that XSLT uses a newer namespace. XSLT introduced a significant number of new features subsequent to the release of Internet Explorer 5, and stylesheets must be updated to XSLT conformance before these features can be added.

Download, installation and usage

Download the newest version of MSXML from MSDN, as well as the XSL-to-XSLT Converter xsltconv.exe under the XSL section. Make sure to install Msxml3.dll in Replace Mode. Running MSXML 3.0 in replace mode enables you to take full advantage of the latest XSLT features in the MSXML 3.0 parser.

The converter itself simply consists of an XSLT stylesheet and a JavaScript file. The script calls the XSLT processor on an XML file with the converter stylesheet.

Run xsl-xslt-converter.xslt on your Internet Explorer 5 XSL stylesheet. Convert.js is a Windows Scripting Host file that can be used to run xsl-xslt-converter.xslt from an MS-DOS command line:

WScript convert.js xsl-stylesheet [output-stylesheet]

If the output-stylesheet parameter is omitted, a "t" is appended to the xsl-stylesheet parameter. For example, the following code would create a new file named "style.xslt":

WScript convert.js style.xsl