Split XML into multiple HTML files using XSLT

Question

I'm looking for a way to split an XML file into multiple HTML files which in the end, should contain a table.

An example xml:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>

<table>
  <row>
    <name>user1</name>
    <email>email1</email>
  </row>
  <row>
    <name>user2</name>
    <email>email2</email>
  </row>
  <row>
   <name>user3</name>
   <email>email3</email>
  </row>
  <row>
    <name>user4</name>
    <email>email4</email>
  </row>
  <row>
    <name>user5</name>
    <email>email5</email>
  </row>

  ...

</table>

Now I want to split this xml file into different HTML files which contain a specific range from the XML file. Each HTML file should contain 3 rows from the XML for example.

table1.html

<table>
  <tr>
    <td>user1</td>
    <td>email1</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td>user2</td>
    <td>email2</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td>user3</td>
    <td>email3</td>
  </tr>
</table>

table2.html

<table>
  <tr>
    <td>user4</td>
    <td>email4</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td>user5</td>
    <td>email5</td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td>user6</td>
    <td>email6</td>
  </tr>
</table>

Anyone an idea how the XSLT file needs to be formatted? I'm using ruby-xslt to load the XML and XSLT file and convert the whole thing to HTML.

Answer 1

An XSLT 1.0 transformation can create only a single output.

You may still have a single result that contains all the generated tables. Then you need to process this result outside XSLT (or perform N transformations on it) in order to produce the N separate outputs needed.

I strongly recommend that you use XSLT 2.0 for this task -- this can easily be accomplished using the new xsl:result-document instruction.

Answer 2

If you apply this XSLT to your input XML it will split the XML into tables containing 3 records:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<xsl:stylesheet xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform" version="1.0">

<xsl:strip-space elements="*"/>
<xsl:output indent="yes" method="xml"/>

<xsl:template match="node()|@*">
    <xsl:copy>
        <xsl:apply-templates select="node()|@*"/>
    </xsl:copy>
</xsl:template>
<!-- split file up into row elements -->
<xsl:template match="row[position() mod 3 = 1]">
    <table>
        <xsl:copy-of select=".|following-sibling::row[not(position() > 2)]"/>
    </table>
</xsl:template>

<xsl:template match="row"/>
</xsl:stylesheet>

OUTPUT XML:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<table>
<table>
    <row>
        <name>user1</name>
        <email>email1</email>
    </row>
    <row>
        <name>user2</name>
        <email>email2</email>
    </row>
    <row>
        <name>user3</name>
        <email>email3</email>
    </row>
</table>
<table>
    <row>
        <name>user4</name>
        <email>email4</email>
    </row>
    <row>
        <name>user5</name>
        <email>email5</email>
    </row>
</table>
</table>

If you run the OUTPUT XML through this XSLT you will get the wanted result:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<xsl:stylesheet xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform" version="1.0">

<xsl:template match="node()|@*">
    <xsl:copy>
        <xsl:apply-templates select="node()|@*"/>
    </xsl:copy>
</xsl:template>

<xsl:template match="row">
    <tr>
        <xsl:apply-templates select="node()|@*"/>
    </tr>
</xsl:template>

<xsl:template match="email | name">
    <td>
        <xsl:apply-templates select="node()|@*"/>
    </td>
</xsl:template>


</xsl:stylesheet>

final OUTPUT XML:

    <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><table>
<table>
    <tr>
        <td>user1</td>
        <td>email1</td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
        <td>user2</td>
        <td>email2</td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
        <td>user3</td>
        <td>email3</td>
    </tr>
</table>
<table>
    <tr>
        <td>user4</td>
        <td>email4</td>
    </tr>
    <tr>
        <td>user5</td>
        <td>email5</td>
    </tr>
</table>
</table>

In my opinion this should work with XSLT 1.0 as long as you have the opportunity to run 2 stylesheets on your input XML.

Best regards, Peter

Answer 3

To create multiple HTML files in a single XSLT transformation you will need the xsl:result-document instruction, which is only available in XSLT 2.0. You don't get that with ruby-xslt unfortunately.