DocBook Xsl: The Complete Guide (4th Edition)

If you have DocBook markup that you need to turn into html or pdf YOU CANNOT LIVE WITHOUT THIS BOOK! That's right I'm shouting. This book is really that important, and that well written. Do bear in mind that you need to know a thing or two about XSLT and XSL-FO or you won't understand a thing you are reading.The DocBook stylesheets have been carefully written to be both customizable and extensible; after all, no two organizations are likely to have the same format requirements for their documents. This book describes how you can develop your own customization layer between the DocBook stylesheets and your formatted document. Most developers, even those with a lot of time on their hands, would be unlikely to discover all of the techniques described in this book for accomplishing that task.This book is especially useful if you need to produce pdf documents using XSL-FO. The html output is nice but you can easily format it with CSS. XSL-FO is a large and complex specification for marking up text and images to produce pdf documents. XSL-FO is so detailed that it takes a ton of markup to create even a modest document. The DocBook stylesheets generate a ton and a half of XSL-FO markup and the beauty of the techniques described in this book is that you only modify those things that represent the special needs of your document. I totally agree with previous reviewers, this book is essential.

This book MUST be on your bookshelf if you do any work with docbook and use the standard stylesheets. It is true that the contents of the book are fully available online as HTML documents, but that is no substitute for having the printed book in your hands if you need to do extensive work. Bob Stayton covers nearly all aspects of user customization available in the stylesheets from simply setting a few parameter values (which can be done from the command line in most cases) to writing or rewriting templates for extensive user customization.

I purchased that book as soon as it came out: I just knew I'd need it some day. That day came three weeks ago and I got into the book with a vengeance. I needed to utterly customize the docbooks stylesheets and produce 12'000 different pdf's in four languages out of a huge documentation DB. With the book next to me it was a breeze. Extremely well written, knowledgeable, accurate, just verbose enough to get the point across and and and.Beware: this is a book for people who are already very well versed in docbook in general, and in XSL in particular.One does wish the author would have offered ant versions of his scripts as well as Make versions. But that's a matter of taste.

Yes, I know there is another manual but it's more of a starter. This is the book you need to help you figure out how to actually make Docbook work. I keep it by my side (and have advised an intern working in Docbook to do so as well). I guarantee if you get on the Docbook-apps discussion list, and ask a question most times the answer will come out of this book.

This book needs to be beside the computer (and I do mean RIGHT beside) anyone who is attempting to support or modify docbook applications for the first time. Do that, and you may just be able to put away the extra strength excedrin. Without it, you might have a few problems......Here's why:Last year, I had the pleasure of implementing docbook for a large company down in Oklahoma. However, I didn't know much about XSL at the time or for that matter docbook; other than how to markup documents and make changes to the DTD. In other words I was a rookie. I had two tools at my disposal; the definative guide and docbook documentation. Any developer would understand what a rookie who is trying to muddle through docbook documentation is trying to go through..... I had a bit of consulting from Arbortext but other than that I was on my own. The definitive guide has very little information on publishing XML information and barely even mentions XSL. Thus, my modifications consisted of looking at existing code and attempting a patch job. Even with the training I'd had on XSLT it did not help me to find files that I didn't know existed. This book solves that problem and gets you off the ground running.While the book is NOT a tututorial on XSL is does give a brief overview on the subject. This book talks about implementing XSL in a docbook environment as there are plenty of books in the market that teach you how to code XSL. An understanding of XML is expected and knowledge of docbook is certainly helpful. Topics covered include how to find docbooks XSL stylesheets (or obtain them for free, if you don't already have them)and tells you how to set them up, customize them for your environment, use special stylesheet output features and work with docbook options.In short, if you need to learn how to implement XSL in a docbook environment; get this book in your hands and don't let it go. It's too valuable a commodity!

This is a monster book, full of high-powered XSLT and XSLT2, with a strong emphasis on DocBook 5. If you are a Docbook fan, this is the work to get. My grasp of XSLT, XML, catalogs and schemas went up like a rocket as I read my way in. Only one quibble; creating a german-language website with DocBook 5 and XSLT on an ordinary qwerty keyboard requires a way of handling umlauts and the like. Stayton is downright opaque on this subject. I had to trawl the web for help.Otherwise, highly recommended.

"DocBook XSL, the definitive guide" (en anglais) est indispensable, au même titre que "DocBook, the definitive guide" chez O'Reilly de Norman Walsh de Leonard Muellner, pour tout professionnel qui écrit de la documentation technique au format DocBook. "DocBook XSL" explique comment paramétrer et même comment réécrire partiellement les feuilles de style qui permettent de convertir la documentation en PDF et en HTML. On obtient ainsi un contrôle très fin de la personnalisation et du rendu. Le style est clair et Bob Stayton a fait un gros effort pour essayer de mettre de l'ordre dans un sujet très dense.