# XSLT Task

## XSLT

The name `style` is a deprecated name for the same task.

### Description

Process a set of documents via XSLT.

This is useful for building views of XML based documentation, or for generating code.

Note: If you are using JDK 1.4 or higher, this task does not require external libraries not supplied in the Ant distribution. However, often the built in XSL engine is not as up to date as a fresh download, so an update is still highly recommended. See Library Dependencies for more information.

It is possible to refine the set of files that are being processed. This can be done with the includes, includesfile, excludes, excludesfile and defaultexcludes attributes. With the includes or includesfile attribute you specify the files you want to have included by using patterns. The exclude or excludesfile attribute is used to specify the files you want to have excluded. This is also done with patterns. And finally with the defaultexcludes attribute, you can specify whether you want to use default exclusions or not. See the section on directory based tasks, on how the inclusion/exclusion of files works, and how to write patterns.

This task forms an implicit FileSet and supports all attributes of `<fileset>` (`dir` becomes `basedir`) as well as the nested `<include>`, `<exclude>` and `<patternset>` elements.

Note: Unlike other similar tasks, this task treats directories that have been matched by the include/exclude patterns of the implicit fileset in a special way. It will apply the stylesheets to all files contain in them as well. Since the default include pattern is `**` this means it will apply the stylesheet to all files. If you specify an excludes pattern, it may still work on the files matched by those patterns because the parent directory has been matched. If this behavior is not what you want, set the scanincludedirectories attribute to false.

Starting with Ant 1.7 this task supports nested resource collections in addition to (or instead of, depending on the useImplicitFileset attribute) the implicit fileset formed by this task.

This task supports the use of a nested `<param>` element which is used to pass values to an `<xsl:param>` declaration.

This task supports the use of a nested xmlcatalog element which is used to perform Entity and URI resolution.

### Parameters

Attribute | Description | Required
basedir | where to find the source XML file, default is the project's basedir. | No
destdir | directory in which to store the results. | Yes, unless in and out have been specified.
extension | desired file extension to be used for the targets. If not specified, the default is ".html". Will be ignored if a nested `<mapper>` has been specified. | No

style

name of the stylesheet to use - given either relative to the project's basedir or as an absolute path.
Alternatively, a nested element which ant can interpret as a resource can be used to indicate where to find the stylesheet
deprecated variation :
If the stylesheet cannot be found, and if you have specified the attribute basedir for the task, ant will assume that the style attribute is relative to the basedir of the task.

No, if you specify the location of the stylesheet as a nested resource element

classpath | the classpath to use when looking up the XSLT processor. | No
classpathref | the classpath to use, given as reference to a path defined elsewhere. | No
force | Recreate target files, even if they are newer than their corresponding source files or the stylesheet. | No; default is false

processor

name of the XSLT processor to use. Permissible values are :

- "trax" for a TraX compliant processor (ie JAXP interface implementation such as Xalan 2 or Saxon)
- "xalan" for the Apache XML Xalan (version 1) processor
- the name of a custom class implementing the interface `org.apache.tools.ant.taskdefs.XSLTLiaison.`

Defaults to trax, followed by xalan The first one found in your class path is the one that is used.
DEPRECATED - xalan (xalan1) is deprecated and no more supported..

No

includes | comma- or space-separated list of patterns of files that must be included. All files are included when omitted. | No
includesfile | the name of a file. Each line of this file is taken to be an include pattern | No
excludes | comma- or space-separated list of patterns of files that must be excluded. No files (except default excludes) are excluded when omitted. | No
excludesfile | the name of a file. Each line of this file is taken to be an exclude pattern | No
defaultexcludes | indicates whether default excludes should be used or not ("yes"/"no"). Default excludes are used when omitted. | No
in | specifies a single XML document to be styled. Should be used with the out attribute. | No
out | specifies the output name for the styled result from the in attribute. | No
scanincludeddirectories | If any directories are matched by the includes/excludes patterns, try to transform all files in these directories. Default is `true` | No
reloadstylesheet | Control whether the stylesheet transformer is created anew for every transform opertaion. If you set this to true, performance may suffer, but you may work around a bug in certain Xalan-J versions. Default is `false`. Since Ant 1.5.2. | No
useImplicitFileset | Whether the implicit fileset formed by this task shall be used. If you set this to false you must use nested resource collections - or the in attribute, in which case this attribute has no impact anyway. Default is `true`. Since Ant 1.7. | No

### Parameters specified as nested elements

#### any resource collection

since Ant 1.7

Use resource collections to specify resources that the stylesheet should be applied to. Use a nested mapper and the task's destdir attribute to specify the output files.

#### classpath

The classpath to load the processor from can be specified via a nested `<classpath>`, as well - that is, a path-like structure.

#### xmlcatalog

The xmlcatalog element is used to perform Entity and URI resolution.

#### param

Param is used to pass a parameter to the XSL stylesheet.

> #### Parameters

> Attribute | Description | Required
> name | Name of the XSL parameter | Yes
> expression | Text value to be placed into the param. Was originally intended to be an XSL expression. | Yes
> if | The param will only passed if this property is set. | No
> unless | The param will only passed unless this property is set. | No

#### outputproperty ('trax' processors only)

Used to specify how you wish the result tree to be output as specified in the XSLT specifications.

> #### Parameters

> Attribute | Description | Required
> name | Name of the property | Yes
> value | value of the property. | Yes

#### factory ('trax' processors only)

Used to specify factory settings.

> #### Parameters

> Attribute | Description | Required
> name | fully qualified classname of the transformer factory to use. For example `org.apache.xalan.processor.TransformerFactoryImpl` or `org.apache.xalan.xsltc.trax.TransformerFactoryImpl` or `net.sf.saxon.TransformerFactoryImpl`... | No. Defaults to the JAXP lookup mechanism.

> ### Parameters specified as nested elements

> #### attribute

> Used to specify settings of the processor factory. The attribute names and values are entirely processor specific so you must be aware of the implementation to figure them out. Read the documentation of your processor. For example, in Xalan 2.x:

> - http://xml.apache.org/xalan/features/optimize (boolean)
> - http://xml.apache.org/xalan/features/incremental (boolean)
> - ...
> And in Saxon 7.x:
> - http://saxon.sf.net/feature/allow-external-functions (boolean)
> - http://saxon.sf.net/feature/timing (boolean)
> - http://saxon.sf.net/feature/traceListener (string)
> - http://saxon.sf.net/feature/treeModel (integer)
> - http://saxon.sf.net/feature/linenumbering (integer)
> - ...

> > #### Parameters

> > Attribute | Description | Required
> > name | Name of the attribute | Yes
> > value | value of the attribute. | Yes

#### mapper

since Ant 1.6.2

You can define filename transformations by using a nested mapper element. The default mapper used by `<xslt>` removes the file extension from the source file and adds the extension specified via the extension attribute.

#### nested element of type resource to indicate the stylesheet

Since Ant 1.7

You can use nested elements which extend resource to indicate the stylesheet. See resources to see the concrete syntax you can use

### Examples

>     <style basedir="doc" destdir="build/doc"
>            extension=".html" style="style/apache.xsl"/>

> #### Using an xmlcatalog

>     <xslt basedir="doc" destdir="build/doc"
>           extension=".html" style="style/apache.xsl">
>       <xmlcatalog refid="mycatalog"/>
>     </xslt>

>     <xslt basedir="doc" destdir="build/doc"
>        extension=".html" style="style/apache.xsl">
>        <xmlcatalog>
>            <dtd
>              publicId="-//ArielPartners//DTD XML Article V1.0//EN"
>              location="com/arielpartners/knowledgebase/dtd/article.dtd"/>
>        </xmlcatalog>
>     </xslt>

> #### Using XSL parameters

>     <xslt basedir="doc" destdir="build/doc"
>           extension=".html" style="style/apache.xsl">
>       <param name="date" expression="07-01-2000"/>
>     </xslt>

> Then if you declare a global parameter "date" with the top-level element <xsl:param name="date"/>, the variable `$date` will subsequently have the value 07-01-2000.

> #### Using output properties

>     <xslt in="doc.xml" out="build/doc/output.xml"
>           style="style/apache.xsl">
>       <outputproperty name="method" value="xml"/>
>       <outputproperty name="standalone" value="yes"/>
>       <outputproperty name="encoding" value="iso8859_1"/>
>       <outputproperty name="indent" value="yes"/>
>     </xslt>

> #### Using factory settings

>     <xslt in="doc.xml" out="build/doc/output.xml"
>           style="style/apache.xsl">
>       <factory name="org.apache.xalan.processor.TransformerFactoryImpl">
>         <attribute name="http://xml.apache.org/xalan/features/optimize" value="true"/>
>       </factory>
>     </xslt>

> #### Using a mapper

>     <xslt basedir="in" destdir="out"
>           style="style/apache.xsl">
>       <mapper type="glob" from="*.xml.en" to="*.html.en"/>
>     </xslt>

> #### Using a nested resource to define the stylesheet

>     <xslt in="data.xml" out="${out.dir}/out.xml">
>         <url url="${printParams.xsl.url}"/>
>         <param name="set" expression="value"/>
>     </xslt>

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