Reuters XML Slide Toolkit

Last updated: 1 June 2001
Version: Alpha 0.2
Comments to: Anthony B. Coates, tony.coates@reuters.com

Reuters XML Slide Toolkit is an XSL-T script (slides-docbook-to-fo.xsl) that converts a subset of DocBook 4.1.2 to XSL-FO, which can then be converted to a suitable display format (e.g. PDF). The toolkit has developed through a number of generations; the first versions used a custom slide DTD and generated dynamic HTML; later versions used Jon Bosak's slide DTD and generated SVG. The latest solution has proven the most satisfactory for the author; using DocBook 4.1.2 (actually, a very limited subset thereof), generating XSL-FO, and then converting that to PDF using RenderX's XEP 2.01. You should be able to use Apache's FOP, but getting the background image scaling correct depends on having an image editor which lets you set the dots-per-inch correctly. The toolkit currently uses an XEP extension (thanks, guys) which allows the background image to be scaled. The extension should be ignored if you use FOP. Feedback on any issues with FOP would be greatly appreciated.

The toolkit is currently set up to generate full-screen 1024x768 slides. With Acrobat 4 or later, use Ctrl-L to enter full screen mode, the spacebar or a mouse-click to advance, and Esc to exit.

Have a look at the sample (there is no real documentation at this stage). Basically, the toolkit assumes that any simplesect in the document is a slide for the presentation. Bullet lists, paragraphs, and graphics are supported, as these have been used by the author. Almost everything else is not supported (warnings are generated when such items are encountered), but please contact the author if you need something, or if you add a useful template to the transformation script. The current functionality was sufficient for the author's presentation at XML Europe 2001, so it works. There are a lot of manifest constants that should be converted to parameters, so feedback on which ones should be done first is welcome.

Notes

• This is alpha software, so anything and everything may change without notice. That said, it has been pretty stable of late.

License

This software is not a product. It is provided for demonstration purposes only. Reuters makes no guarantees, express or implied, and accepts no liability for consequences arising from the use of this software. You are welcome to use this software, but doing so is entirely at your own discretion and risk.

Copyright © 2001 Reuters Limited. Author: Anthony B. Coates.

The Reuters XML Slide Toolkit is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of Version 2.1 of the GNU Lesser General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation. This library is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; not even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY, or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See Version 2.1 of the GNU Lesser General Public License for more details. You should have received a copy of Version 2.1 of the GNU lesser General Public License along with this library. If not, you can find it here.