FireFox and XSL's Variables

(This was a comment-response to David's comment on yesterday's entry, but ended up being too big to be an appropriate comment.)

If there's one thing I'll remember from my current job, it'll be that ASP is monopolitically evil slag. I do not intend to have my photo gallery be stuck in IE specifically because I somehow convinced you (maybe by threat of nuclear war?) to install IIS on FallenEarth.

...Unfortunately, I'm almost positive that Mozilla or FireFox users won't be able to see my gallery anyway (don't know about Opera). FireFox can NOT handle calls to an <xsl:variable> element's value. The element itself doesn't cause errors, but if I ever try to use the value for anything (via the $thatvariablevalue syntax), FireFox's XSL parser says there's an error, and instead of being helpful and describing it, the error message is null. The same result comes from Mozilla.

I hate to say this, but because IE can handle the variable calls, IE has FireFox beat at this point.

Oh, and php and a database probably would be a more optimal solution (or even just downloading someone else's scripts) to creating something as common as a photo gallery, but I've been dying to learn XSL. So, I'm keeping the photos' information in an XML document that has an XSL-Transform associated with it. You should see the finished product in a couple days, I've been obsessively working on it much more than I should be.

In Other News: CEO and Photo Gallery

Well, at the very least, the CEO doesn't look like some kid with a skinny neck.

In other news: an update on the XML-Driven Photo Gallery
I scrapped the Java and XML interplay when I realized that I didn't know how to use Java in a scripting fashion period, much less on this server (if I even have that kind of user-permission), and I'm not sure I want to invest the time to learn. I went back to the ab. fab. XSLT Tutorial and got enough things working with the photo gallery that I can display the photo I want, and all of its associated data, including comments! ...Unfortunately, there are a few current snags in the project, and any help people can offer is quite welcome.

1. I don't know how to set an xsl variable more than once. I tried having '<xsl:variable name='curPhoto'>13</xsl:variable>' inside a <span> element, and then using JavaScript to set the span's innerHTML to that xsl element with a different body (from 13 to 0). I get an "Object Expected" error and useless line number from IE when I click on the button that calls that script. In FireFox, I'm just told that there's an XSLT Transformation error. I hate to say it, but IE has FireFox beat at this point in testing.
2. I'm not very sure how I'm going to implement comments on an automated basis. Again, my lack of scripting knowledge comes into play. My ultimate goal is to have comment elements within the XML file, as children of photo elements. Does anybody have an idea better than just having the comment form's ACTION attribute send me e-mails?
3. Lastly, I would like to have a valid XML document, validated by a DTD (I don't know the other way of validating an XML file), but I'd also like to allow people to include their own markup in comments, like bolding, changing a font color, etc. CDATA doesn't seem to let me get away with this, nor does the "ANY" element-content type. I suppose I could live without italics tags, but it's one of those things I'd really like to have.

I wrote a while ago that I planned to have a handle on XML and XSL by the end of summer. Summer's not over yet; theoretically, I'm ahead of schedule in that regard. I wish I could say that about the rest of my work.

A Politics Plug

For reasons which probably don't need to be elaborated upon, I recall the name of johnkerryisadouchebagbutimvotingforhimanyway.com with great ease. I checked out the essays outlined on the left of the page, starting with the 4th ("Why This is Not the Time or the Place to Vote for a 3rd Party Candidate"), but it is unfortunately still incomplete. It probably won't ever be completed, according to what he wrote in place of essay 5 ("Why Every Conservative Should Seriously Consider Voting Democrat this Fall"). It is a link to a reputable article in the New York Press.

I found that article to be the single greatest political paper I have ever read. That may be an untrue statement, actually, but it did remind me of a quote of Raphael Clancy from my math program (of which I can only remember the gist):

"Yeah, as an anthro. major, I can feel content with knowing cool stuff about Rome, and seeing it happen again. I'll be able to tell my kids, 'I saw the transition from Republic to Empire!'"

Spread this article around if you can. I am a sincere believer that the more Bush's campaign hurts, the better; if you aren't now, you may be after you read this article. Please at least note the $10 trillion, and factor your current age and projected lifespan into the author's logic.

The Conservative Case Against George W. Bush

Also, if this link should ever become broken, please inform me (Loup-Vert@comcast.net). Thank you.

Daily Zero and a Negatory

The Olympian, Sunday, August 22, 2004: Page E1 (Business). Web archive, without pictures, here.

The question now is this: Do I write the editor and ask him to change the caption to "Nelson," or adjoin "Looking?" Actually, another question is, "How much power can I levy in Capital Medical Center?"

The answer to the second question may be "Not so much, because you walked into Group Health the day after this was published. Traitor." Oh well. An appointment's an appointment, whether or not I'm depicted to be CEO of the hospital across the street.

Forest Shade

If you don't yet see trees and sunshine -- just wait a sec. They'll grow on you, and sprout out of the banners in due seconds.

I don't care how lame the "Growing" theme of this entry is. "Growing" is really how I treated this stylesheet. I've been developing this since May, and for weeks all I could do was change a color every Saturday or so. So, really, what you see grew after around twenty weeks. I hope you like it.

In other news, I've shelved (read: made to vaporware) the XML/Java project with the camping pictures. I don't honestly think I have the time to develop a photo gallery system all on my own, and I realized I didn't have a clue on how to implement a comment system (one of the things I really wanted) without learning server-side PHP. I'm declaring my time stretched and worn, since I've been too busy with my Java ILC to do any work on my GRE studies.

By the end of September, I'll post a few of the choice shots with some descriptions in an entry here. Or, if things go much, much better than I foresee them going with my Java schedule, I'll get back to Java and XML. In the end, XML seems so incredibly useful that I'd have to mightily kick myself for not figuring out how to use it with Java. I just need more time...like, a month. That'd be the best birthday present to get: a month without hassle. I think I can wait 'til next summer for that. I find myself patient enough.

After 11 days, I should have content.

I have dancing I want to write about. However, I'm too distracted by working on stuff to get anything written. I also have camping photos to disribute to people; that, I am currently doing something about.

As I write this, I'm creating an XML-driven photo gallery, coded in Java. I thought it would've been neat-o to do it in XSLT, but Barnes & Noble didn't have the necessary Complete Idiot's Guide; they did, however, have a book relating Java and XML. I've already done XML work in JavaScript and ASP (sorry, Mr. Bayle), so I thought "Schucks, that doesn't look too hard!"

I expect to lose two weekends to this project. On a related note, can anybody direct me to a piece of software that can create thumbnails of .jpgs? I'd really rather not have to manually shrink 80 images. Danke.

2nd-Degree Stupidity

Jen Clark: Have you seen this?

Jen Clark: http://www.rinkworks.com/stupid/

me: Nope...

me: But I probably will have by tonight =)

Jen Clark: It's funny.

Jen Clark: Those poor tech support people...

me: ow

me: Ok, I'm not reading any more, I just smacked my head in awe at dumbness and hit my eye..

Jen Clark: lol

me: I don't feel qualified to read that stuff anymore.

Shuttler's Tip

There are always things to do.

Saturday night, I helped out at a wedding -- one of Jim's uncles was marrying his girlfriend of twelve years. It's nice to see that kind of dedication in a couple, I hope they have a good marriage. Anyways, the way I helped out was driving a shuttle van -- the Shaggin' Wagon, big Jim's Astro Van. It was a good gig, paid ok, and the food was free. I even got a little offtime to shoot the shit with Jim, talkin' about campin'...and...shootin'...and...

Hmm, camping. That'll be three days, maybe the whole three days, of being close to a beach. I won't bring any math books (promise!), any books at all. I will bring paper and a pen, in case I want to write about something -- there's still a bird moment I want to write down from last year's camping trip, in case I should ever forget it.

Speaking of forgetting things, I'm going to go back to the shuttling gig: Again, the pay was good, as was the food. I discovered the Caesar Salad Sandwich on accident, that was pretty tasty. I thought it'd be a pleasant thing for my fridge to have some of the leftover food come home with me. I asked the groom as he was paying me for the night's work if I could take some of that leftover food off of his hands -- I didn't get any tips from shuttling, so why not get food instead? I persuaded.

Here's the trick to getting free food, by the way: Do something at a wedding, then afterwards ask for a leftover something-or-other as the head person's trying to think of what the hell he's going to do with all that unexpected catering stockpile.

I scored a tub of sliced fruit. All looked good, for there were bountiful oranges and grapes. However, I tried one of the melons that night, and became really worried when I tasted a bit of alcohol. I sampled the melon again tonight, and again it tasted a little spiked...and, two or three burps later, I knew I got a little something extra with that tub o' fruit. I'm guessing it came from all the merry drinking that was going on at the wedding.

So, this is my first entry written with any alcohol in me period; I don't plan to have a second. I'm scared of forgetting things, and I have this mental link between alcohols and gaps in the space-time continuum that shoot me into morning on the 'morrow.

It's unfortunate that after the last two weeks of being blogless, I only really have two things to write about, including this. This programming thing may be getting to my life -- maybe. I at least plan to make programming as prominent a part of my week as possible: My guess goes that camping will be much more enjoyable if I'm tired enough to take in the relaxation. I hope the guess goes well.