Archive of UserLand's first discussion group, started October 5, 1998.

Re: Request for help: frontier-side xul.

Author:Chuck Shotton
Posted:3/20/2000; 8:43:50 AM
Topic:Request for help: frontier-side xul.
Msg #:15641 (In response to 15635)
Prev/Next:15640 / 15642

As Dave noted, I've taken a shot at getting some sort of XML output from MacBird. Right now, it's a simple (homemade) syntax that converts a card into an XML representation. Importing XML is not implemented yet, since there are a LOT more required hooks in a XML input parser than going out.

MacBird seems to be a logical choice for a tool to build XML-based user interface descriptions, but I've run into a couple of non-code hurdles that may make things difficult. First, it's not precisely clear what the output XML syntax should look like. I have a target platform in mind for the mods I'm working on, but it may not be the best format. I'm not familiar with XUL, so a pointer to it would help.

Second, the ability to attach scripts and actions to MacBird UI parts begs the question of what sort of scripting support to pass through the XML. If it includes something other than UserTalk syntax (which it should in order to have maximum flexibility), there's some work to be done in specifying how attached scripts are identified, displayed, etc. This is surely an extension to any existing XML spec out there, I'd guess. At a minimum, MacBird can just treat everything as a text-only blob and base-64 it into the output data.

A minor nit, there are some logistical problems with the CVS archive on SourceForge. Specifically, someone checked in all of the AppleDouble files for every one of the Carbon headers as well as all the MacBird source. So a CVS update involves over 1000 file transfers! It'd be nice if that CVS archive could get redone to just include the MacBird files, the CodeWarrior project files, and a tar or Stuffit archive containing the Carbon stuff. Otherwise it's going to be a real pain to deal with this CVS process going forward.

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