XSLT Cookbook: Solutions and Examples for XML and XSLT Developers, 2nd Edition

I had worked with XSLT for some time when I purchased this book. I needed something to help me move to the next level. This book provided a lot of help to improve XSLT scripts I wrote. The book is relatively large compared to other cookbooks I've used (over 700 pages) which means it is full of good recipes.I expected this book to be a cookbook and, as such, have solutions to common problems. It definitely offers that. It has a good structure that includes recipes for discrete problems such as string and date/time manipulation. It also has recipes for advanced composite scenarios such as XML to SVG, code generation, and extending XSLT.One of my favorite aspects of this book is that it provides some foundational, introductory information as well. It's not *just* a cookbook. There is a chapter dedicated to XPath as well as chapters on Testing, Debugging, and Functional Programming. This is excellent for those who both want to advance their skills from beginner or from intermediate.I think XSLT is an often overlooked yet powerful tool and I rely on this book to help me with XSLT generation. It has been useful in many scenarios such as customizing SharePoint data views, converting XML data to XHTML for display, modifying 3rd-party-generated XML for saving and restoring in custom situations, and for streamlining data storage. And this book has helped me with all of that.

This book is for the experienced XSLT developer. It will provide many, many code samples right from the beginning. I purchased this book thinking I can learn XSLT but, this book is not for the beginner. With that, I am not saying you should not purchase it. What I am saying is that I found a very good companion book: XSLT FOR DUMMIES. Believe it or not, this was my first for dummies book. Don't let the title fool you, this is a great first book to understand XSLT. I think the cookbook will start you where the dummies book ends but with a very different approach: To give you ideas. From the dummies book, you will understand what XPath and other key topics which you will already need to understand for the cookbook. For example, the cookbook goes right to covering XPATH in chapter one but assumes you know what and how it works. I hope this review will help everyone understand what this book will do for you and the correct approach in using it.

Great book

Having twenty years of experience in programming, but being a novice with XSL, I needed help on a project. I purchased this book for its title, hoping to gleam examples that may assist with what I needed. I was not disappointed! This book is filled with example XSL transformation code! But, buyer beware! This book is for developers with knowledge of XSLT. If you need to learn the language, then purchase the XSLT for Dummies book, it is quite competent in it's content. (I did.) But for what the title indicates it is, then it is a fantastic purchase! I highly recommend this book, as it saved me through the project I was assigned.

Sometimes, XSLT is just a bit opaque :-) ... and this book is one way to get your mind around solutions to common problems. I don't use cookbooks a lot, but I find they can help when you really feel like you are missing something. Since these books are not expensive, I find having them on my tablet (I buy only kindle these days) can be very useful when ideas aren't coming quickly.

I've just completed a job where one of my primary functions was editing, teaching, and solving problems with XSLT. I started that job as an experienced programmer with little experience in XSLT. I frequently referred to this book whenever I thought, "I bet XSLT can do this, but how?" For example, if you are already familiar with common scripting languages and programming libraries, one of the first things you will notice about XSLT is a lack of regular expression functionality. I referred to the "search and replace" function in this book several times. This book is a real problem solver.

This is a great book with a collection of XSLT solutions to difficult and non-trivial XSLT problems. It covers XSLT 2.0 and shows to you how elegant 2.0 solution can be comparable to ugly and monstrous 1.0 listing.But don't make the same mistake as I did! It is not a learning book! It is a book for programmers that already know XSLT at least a bit and want to improve their skills in this language. If you don't know XSLT at all, it would be better to you to purchase another book together with this one.

Just started working at a University that uses XSLT and this book has helped me immensely in learning XSLT and using it to my benefit. It may be tricky for people completely new to programming to pick up this book and get anything out of it. But if you have a basic computer science or programming background and want to see some examples of how to use XSLT, this book is for you.

Some really useful stuff in here, but not a starter's book (at least not for me - I had to buy Michael Kay's XSLT 2.0 Programmer's Reference to understand what was going on and I've been programming for nigh on 30 years) You really need a firm grasp of XSLT to get the most out of this book. It provides some useful comparisons between XSLT 1.0 and 2.0 and does some great things with SVG.