SGML-SPGrove-0.01: perl module for loading SGML, XML, HTML

Title: SGML-SPGrove-0.01: perl module for loading SGML, XML, HTML

Author: Ken MacLeod <ken@bitsko.slc.ut.us>

Date: 05 Oct 1997 18:26:00 -0500


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[[this is a repost, the previous article has been cancelled]]


                            SGML::SPGrove

                   A Perl 5 module for loading SGML,
                   XML, and HTML document instances
                       using James Clark's SP.


                             Ken MacLeod
                         ken@bitsko.slc.ut.us

INTRODUCTION

    The SGML::SPGrove module links with James Clark's SGML Parser (SP)
    to load SGML, XML, and HTML document instances.

    This is version 0.01.  This release is simple, solid, and usable,
    but features to be added over the next few weeks will make it
    incredibly more useful.  See FUTURE for current status and
    upcoming changes.

    Newer versions of this module can be found at
    <ftp://ftp.uu.net/vendor/bitsko/gdo/>.

    Copyright (C) 1997 Ken MacLeod
    SPGrove is distributed under the same terms as SP.  See the file
    COPYING for distribution terms.

OVERVIEW

    SGML::SPGrove takes a system identifier and passes it to SP to
    parse, as each element is parsed from the document SPGrove builds
    Perl objects to match.  When done parsing, SPGrove returns an
    SGML::SPGrove object that contains the root element of the parsed
    document and an array (hopefully empty :-) of parser errors.

    Elements of the document are SGML::Element objects.  Elements
    have a generic identifier (or name), attributes, and the contents
    of the element.  Attributes are stored as a Perl hash, with the
    values as an array of scalars and SGML::SData objects.  The
    contents of an element may be more Elements, scalars, SData
    objects, or processing instruction (PI) objects.

    SGML::SData objects are replacements for character entity
    references within the document.  The Text::EntityMap perl module
    can be used to map SData replacements from common character entity
    sets to common output formats.

<ftp://ftp.uu.net/vendor/bitsko/entity-map/>

    SGML::PI objects are processing instructions contained within the
    document.

    See the pod/man pages for SGML::SPGrove, SGML::Element,
    SGML::SData, SGML::PI for more info.

INSTALLATION

    SGML::SPGrove requires Perl 5 and James Clark's SP (from the Jade
    distribution).  SP requires a C++ compiler.

<http://www.perl.com>
<http://www.jclark.com>

    1)  SPGrove needs SP's `libsp.a' and include files.  SP's `make
        install' does not install these [I'm working on that, I should
        have an RPM available soon].  Create a workarea for compiling
        SP, compile it and keep the workarea until SPGrove is done.

        Edit SPGrove's Makefile.PL to point `LIBS' to SP's `lib'
        directory and `INC' to SP's three include directories.  I've
        left my templates in to point the way.

    2)  standard Perl module after that,

            perl Makefile.PL
            make
            make check
            make install

        Just so you know, SPGrove's copy of SP's library is included
        in the install, that's over a megabyte and a half.

        FYI, a statically linked perl executable (`make perl') appears
        to run significantly faster, in one test, 17 seconds instead
        of 25 seconds.

FUTURE

    This release is the first eight hours of work, the next eight
    should bring a whole lot more.  This module is not a completly new
    design but is just part of a larger library I've been working on.

    The next two release should support the rest of the ESIS
    information that is available and include iterator classes to help
    walk around the grove.

    Releases after that will be merged back into the library and will
    include transformation, formatting, and other utility classes.