This is an updated revision of Tennison’s "Beginning XSLT", updated for the new revision of the XSLT standard. XSLT is a technology used to transform an XML document with one structure into another document with the same data, but different structure.

This followup to Tennison’s Beginning XSLT, has been updated to accomodate the revised XSLT standard. Part one of this book introduces XML and XSLT at a comfortable pace, and gradually demonstrates techniques for generating HTML (plus other formats), from XML. In part two, Tennison applies theory to real-life XSLT capabilities—including generating graphics.

Each chapter includes step-by-step examples (with code available online), plus review questions at the end, to help you grasp the discussed features. In fact, all of the examples and exercises revolve around an interesting common theme: making TV listings available online. This book lives up to it’s name, and will definitely take you from a novice to a professional, in no time!

This book is an update to Tennison’s Beginning XSLT, now updated for the new revision of the XSLT standard. XSLT is a technology used to transform an XML document with one structure into another document (perhaps XML, but HTML, XHTML, and text are other targets) with the same data, but a different structure.

Beginning XSLT: From Novice to Professional introduces XML and XSLT bit-by-bit, gradually demonstrating the techniques that are required to generate HTML (and other formats) from XML. The second part pulls the theory together by looking at what you can do with XSLT, including generating graphics.

Each chapter has several step-by-step examples, for which code is available online, and a list of exercise questions at the end that help review the new features described in that chapter. All of the examples and exercises are based around a single case study: making TV listings available online.

Too complex for real beginners
I am in a summer XML class for my master’s program. We used another book for basic XML and Tennison’s book for XSLT. For just learning about XSLT, this book is way over my head. The running example throughout the book is too complex for learning the basics and the author assumes the "beginning" reader is more advanced than this. Very disappointing and frustrating to read.

Nicely done.
After reading this book, I have a thorough understanding of XSLT 2.0. I was really surprised that it covered the Sarissa API, which I use extensively and is also used by other APIs such as MapBuilder.

Though it says 2.0, 1.0 is covered in the book too, although not specifically. The code in the first 200 pages (and probably more) works with 1.0 as long as you change the namespace references and fix your own typos.

The thing about the community is that most of the XSLT in use is in browsers and is still version 1.0, so 2.0 info isn’t useful - yet, though it is covered well in this book.

This book got me up and running with detail in a few days. The explanations and the chapters flow nicely. I liked that it didn’t read like a PhD dissertation. Good job Jeni.

Sam

Concise, organized and effective
I suggest this book to all intermediate developers.
The organization of the book focus topics from basic xml to dynamic application using xslt.
Each topic is followed by another in a natural way, making you learning step by step.

Personally i like how the book is organized: a feature is followed by a small example just to give you an idea of how it works, some notes about the caveats and a summary to read while revisiting the book later.

This is how books should be organized not as a mere cut & paste from online ref doc as some books did.

Highly recommended if you want to learn xslt and xpath quickly but in an effective way.

Why focus on a soap opera?
This book is pretty good about explaining XSL. My one complaint is that the author focuses a little too much on a British soap opera in her examples. Sure it works as an example, but when your demographic is mostly male and American why would you choose a television show directed towards British females? (Of course I know why, but it simply doesn’t make sense thinking of marketing.)

If you are a beginner to XSLT, you might want to reconsider another book
This book does not start with actually teaching XSLT. Chpt1 is called Beyond HTML (no XSLT) Chpt2 is about XML, Chpt3 is creating HTML from XML (see what I am getting at, SHOW ME THE XSLT!). After getting this book I actually immediately ordered Sams Teach Yourself XSLT in 21 Days because I know from experience these books get you right into the subject matter and get you going. However this book will be valuable due to it’s broad and detailed scope if you have 6 months time to eventually digest it all. At times it is overly wordy on insignificant matter and instead of building on simple examples as you progress the author uses a complete TV guide right off the start which I find to be quite complex to start teaching people!

Not incredibly useful...yet.
I paged through this book and Ms. Tennison’s other book on the subject "Beginning XSLT." I ended up purchasing her first book, "Beginning XSLT" because XSLT 2.0 has yet to gain widespread acceptance in both client and server side technologies. The difference in price between the books was $20 (at least at my local Border’s)...so I went with the cheaper one which instructs you on how to use XSLT that will actually work (1.0). This book, "Beginning XSLT," I highly recommend. Easy to read. Very in depth. A great book on the subject.

Absolutely the best book on the subject
I’m new to XML technology, yet I wanted to do some complex processing using XSLT in a short amount of time. I spent almost a week with other books and online tutorials, but I was not getting anywhere, and was just about ready to punt and use Perl. That is, until I saw the reviews for the previous edition of this book. All those positive reviews apply to this edition too.

This book is very well though out and presented. It is very easy to read; yet it covers the topics in detail. The author understands the difficultly a typical software programmer would face dealing with XSLT and addresses the issues clearly.

If you are new to XSLT and looking for a book, make sure you look at which version is covered in the book. This one covers the latest.

I would absolutely recommend this book. Thanks to the author!