Subject: Re: How can I insert "raw" (X|XHT|HT)ML into my DOM? - msg#00026

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Re: Re: How can I insert "raw" (X|XHT|HT)ML into my DOM?

On Thursday 16 January 2003 13:47, David Corbin wrote: > Joe Caron wrote: > >Hello David: > > > >While the following "cheat" is officially frowned upon, I'm convinced it's > >necessary in a very few hard cases (where you are dynamically inserting > > data that already contains markup, and the pain of creating appropriate > > dom objects is 20 times greater than the guilt you may feel about taking > > the easier way out). > > > >page.setTextContents(""); // remove any placeholder text > > > >CDATASection cds = page.createCDATASection ([some data containing markup > > you want used as markup]); > > > >page.getElementContents().appendChild(cds); > > > >.... > >out.print(page.toDocument(request, response))..... > > Why doesn't that insert a CData in the form of [CData[...]] or what ever > the syntax is? It does if you output to XML (including XHTML, of course). In HTML, there are no CDATA sections, but sometimes the need to put unescaped markup into a DOM. What's more, the semantics of a CDATA section ("leave anything in here as is" :-) more-or-less matches the intended effect of putting chunks of verbatim markup into the document. So, it was kind of reasonable to reuse the CData support in the HTML DOM to support unescaped markup. BTW, here's the obligatory official frown :-) I'd strongly advise you to only use the CDATA hack if there's really no other reasonable way (say, you've got predefined markup in a legacy database or something like this) because putting raw markup into an XMLC DOM has a number of disadvantages: - If you're not careful, you can easily produce documents that are not valid HTML - DOM access methods like Document.getElementById(), Document.getLinks() etc. don't see the elements inside a CDATA node - Automatic URL rewriting doesn't work for links/forms/whatever inside of a CDATA node -- Richard Kunze [ t]ivano Software, Bahnhofstr. 18, 63263 Neu-Isenburg Tel.: +49 6102 80 99 07 - 0, Fax.: +49 6102 80 99 07 - 1 http://www.tivano.de, kunze@xxxxxxxxx

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Re: Re: How can I insert 'raw' (X|XHT|HT)ML into my DOM?

> On Thursday 16 January 2003 13:47, David Corbin wrote: >> Joe Caron wrote: >> >Hello David: >> > >> >While the following "cheat" is officially frowned upon, I'm convinced >> >it's necessary in a very few hard cases (where you are dynamically >> >inserting >> > data that already contains markup, and the pain of creating >> > appropriate dom objects is 20 times greater than the guilt you may >> > feel about taking the easier way out). >> > >> >page.setTextContents(""); // remove any placeholder text >> > >> >CDATASection cds = page.createCDATASection ([some data containing >> >markup >> > you want used as markup]); >> > >> >page.getElementContents().appendChild(cds); >> > >> >.... >> >out.print(page.toDocument(request, response))..... >> >> Why doesn't that insert a CData in the form of [CData[...]] or what >> ever the syntax is? > > It does if you output to XML (including XHTML, of course). > So is there a frowned upon solution for XML? > In HTML, there are no CDATA sections, but sometimes the need to put > unescaped markup into a DOM. What's more, the semantics of a CDATA > section ("leave anything in here as is" :-) more-or-less matches the > intended effect of putting chunks of verbatim markup into the > document. So, it was kind of reasonable to reuse the CData support in > the HTML DOM to support unescaped markup. > > BTW, here's the obligatory official frown :-) I'd strongly advise you > to only use the CDATA hack if there's really no other reasonable way > (say, you've got predefined markup in a legacy database or something > like this) because putting raw markup into an XMLC DOM has a number of > disadvantages: - If you're not careful, you can easily produce > documents that are not valid HTML I can easily produce invalid XML (not-DTD compliant) too. > - DOM access methods like Document.getElementById(), > Document.getLinks() etc. don't see the elements inside a CDATA node > - Automatic URL rewriting doesn't work for links/forms/whatever inside > of a CDATA node I have a solution that is working by generating DOM objects. But it is VERY complex, and am at a point where I think it will be getting even more complex as I go forward. But, the official frown is noted.... > -- > Richard Kunze > > [ t]ivano Software, Bahnhofstr. 18, 63263 Neu-Isenburg > Tel.: +49 6102 80 99 07 - 0, Fax.: +49 6102 80 99 07 - 1 > http://www.tivano.de, kunze@xxxxxxxxx > > > _______________________________________________ > XMLC mailing list > XMLC@xxxxxxxxxxx > http://www.enhydra.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/xmlc

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Re: Re: How can I insert 'raw' (X|XHT|HT)ML into my DOM?

On Thursday 16 January 2003 15:17, dcorbin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote: > > It does if you output to XML (including XHTML, of course). > > So is there a frowned upon solution for XML? No - there's nothing in the DOM API that can be "recycled" for a hack like CDATA sections for HTML. And I really don't see a need for it, either, because it's no problem to parse an XML "snippet" (as opposed to HTML, where it's difficult enough to parse complete documents, let alone snippets) into a DOM with a run-of -the-mill XML parser and import the resulting node tree into the main DOM. > > In HTML, there are no CDATA sections, but sometimes the need to put > > unescaped markup into a DOM. What's more, the semantics of a CDATA > > section ("leave anything in here as is" :-) more-or-less matches the > > intended effect of putting chunks of verbatim markup into the > > document. So, it was kind of reasonable to reuse the CData support in > > the HTML DOM to support unescaped markup. > > > > BTW, here's the obligatory official frown :-) I'd strongly advise you > > to only use the CDATA hack if there's really no other reasonable way > > (say, you've got predefined markup in a legacy database or something > > like this) because putting raw markup into an XMLC DOM has a number of > > disadvantages: - If you're not careful, you can easily produce > > documents that are not valid HTML > > I can easily produce invalid XML (not-DTD compliant) too. Sure - but you can't produce XML that's not wellformed (e.g. has unabalanced tags) as you can with the CDATA hack. > > - DOM access methods like Document.getElementById(), > > Document.getLinks() etc. don't see the elements inside a CDATA node > > - Automatic URL rewriting doesn't work for links/forms/whatever inside > > of a CDATA node > > I have a solution that is working by generating DOM objects. But it is > VERY complex, and am at a point where I think it will be getting even more > complex as I go forward. That's why the CDATA hack is in there, so go ahead and use it. > But, the official frown is noted.... Well, it's more of a caveat that you lose a couple of nice features if you use the CDATA hack, actually. I just couldn't resist the temptation of the first sentence in the original post ("Although it's officially frowned upon, ...") :-) -- Richard Kunze [ t]ivano Software, Bahnhofstr. 18, 63263 Neu-Isenburg Tel.: +49 6102 80 99 07 - 0, Fax.: +49 6102 80 99 07 - 1 http://www.tivano.de, kunze@xxxxxxxxx

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RE: Re: How can I insert 'raw' (X|XHT|HT)ML into my DOM?

Something I have done before is to have another auxilary Document that has the document fragment, or fragments that I want to insert into my main DOM. When creating the main Document, I insert fragments from the other DOM. This allows you the possibility of having many variations in the dynamic data. The auxilary Document may have many "<div>" elements or other block elements. You can pick and choose which one(s) you need to insert into the master document. This may or may not apply to your situation. If the markup comes from an external source, then this may not work for you. Mike. -----Original Message----- From: Richard Kunze [mailto:kunze@xxxxxxxxx] Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2003 5:12 AM To: xmlc@xxxxxxxxxxx Subject: Re: Xmlc: Re: How can I insert 'raw' (X|XHT|HT)ML into my DOM? On Thursday 16 January 2003 15:17, dcorbin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote: > > It does if you output to XML (including XHTML, of course). > > So is there a frowned upon solution for XML? No - there's nothing in the DOM API that can be "recycled" for a hack like CDATA sections for HTML. And I really don't see a need for it, either, because it's no problem to parse an XML "snippet" (as opposed to HTML, where it's difficult enough to parse complete documents, let alone snippets) into a DOM with a run-of -the-mill XML parser and import the resulting node tree into the main DOM. > > In HTML, there are no CDATA sections, but sometimes the need to put > > unescaped markup into a DOM. What's more, the semantics of a CDATA > > section ("leave anything in here as is" :-) more-or-less matches the > > intended effect of putting chunks of verbatim markup into the > > document. So, it was kind of reasonable to reuse the CData support in > > the HTML DOM to support unescaped markup. > > > > BTW, here's the obligatory official frown :-) I'd strongly advise you > > to only use the CDATA hack if there's really no other reasonable way > > (say, you've got predefined markup in a legacy database or something > > like this) because putting raw markup into an XMLC DOM has a number of > > disadvantages: - If you're not careful, you can easily produce > > documents that are not valid HTML > > I can easily produce invalid XML (not-DTD compliant) too. Sure - but you can't produce XML that's not wellformed (e.g. has unabalanced tags) as you can with the CDATA hack. > > - DOM access methods like Document.getElementById(), > > Document.getLinks() etc. don't see the elements inside a CDATA node > > - Automatic URL rewriting doesn't work for links/forms/whatever inside > > of a CDATA node > > I have a solution that is working by generating DOM objects. But it is > VERY complex, and am at a point where I think it will be getting even more > complex as I go forward. That's why the CDATA hack is in there, so go ahead and use it. > But, the official frown is noted.... Well, it's more of a caveat that you lose a couple of nice features if you use the CDATA hack, actually. I just couldn't resist the temptation of the first sentence in the original post ("Although it's officially frowned upon, ...") :-) -- Richard Kunze [ t]ivano Software, Bahnhofstr. 18, 63263 Neu-Isenburg Tel.: +49 6102 80 99 07 - 0, Fax.: +49 6102 80 99 07 - 1 http://www.tivano.de, kunze@xxxxxxxxx _______________________________________________ XMLC mailing list XMLC@xxxxxxxxxxx http://www.enhydra.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/xmlc