Help with field result

[Jalz]

Hi Guys,

I've been trying to get to grips with XML, by downloading the various examples from XML Central and reading the guide FMP 6 Developer Guide to XML/XSL by Beverly Voth. Im stuck on a very small thing, which any one with real xml experience will find very easy to answer.

Ive got my code listed below:

Im exporting fields A through to Z, where the Z field (position() 26) contains a colour value. The data might say Yellow, Red, White etc.

My question is, how do I alter my line 3 to check the value of the field and call the necessary coloured variable.

I have created variables underneath my stylesheet which I would like to call from the above code, ill just give yellow as an example:

#FFFF99

Any help will be much appreciated

Many Thanks

[Martin Brändle]

Instead of using long lists of variable definitions and or statements, it's better to use an external translation table where the individual translation color --> hex RGB value can be looked up with an XPath. You gain a lot of flexibility, and the code is very short and efficient.

See the attached example how this works.

colors.zip

[Jalz]

Thankyou very much Martin,

Your example helped me in more ways than you think. Its further enhanced the my limited knowledge of stylesheets and how they are constructed...

One thing I dont quite understand - (and Im only a beginner - only spent around 28 hours, reading and doing examples), when I define a variable I use a . In your example you dont....the code works, but why do .

Can you recommend any further "basic" books I can increase my knowledge on this subject with the use of FileMaker - especially with MSOFFICE.

Many thanks once again

Jalz

[Martin Brändle]

Whenever an XML tag has no child elements, e.g.

,

you can abbreviate it as

.

See the W3C recommendation for XML, section empty tags.

With respect to MS-Office I have no clue. Best probably is to visit Microsoft XML Developer Center.

The book "XSLT : Programmer's Reference" by Michael Kay, Wiley Publishing, 2003, ISBN 0-7645-4381-4 is a MUST HAVE.

[Jalz]

Hi Martin,

I've been developing the example you gave me and I've finally achieved the result I wanted (in html format). I need to export data from another TO, and Im fairly confident that I can create a stylesheet to get that to present in the format I'd like. Is it possible, when I do the second export, to "merge" the results of the first xlst result?

[Martin Brändle]

Yes, export the first TO as XML (or transform it to another XML format, also possible).

When exporting the second TO, use a stylesheet that loads the first XML TO with the document() function. Then you can transform both XML trees and merge them.