input-forms.xml - can I split it ?

[Monika Mevenkamp]

Can I split the input-forms.xml file into multiple files using some kind of include directive

Monika

—
Monika Mevenkamp
Digital Repository Infrastructure Developer
Princeton University
Phone: 609-258-4161
Skype: mo-meven

[Tim Donohue]

Hi Monika,

Unfortunately, at this time, there's no way to split up the input-forms.xml.  It's a completely custom XML config file, with a completely custom DTD (https://github.com/DSpace/DSpace/blob/dspace-6_x/dspace/config/input-forms.dtd).  Currently, it doesn't have an option to link or import settings from another file.

In DSpace 7, there has been some effort to rethink these configurations (both item-submission.xml and input-forms.xml), but I don't believe this sort of linking is possible yet in DSpace 7 either (hopefully Andrea Bollini will correct me if I'm wrong).  In case it is of interest, the very early notes on this DSpace 7 effort are at https://wiki.duraspace.org/display/DSPACE/Configuration+changes+in+the+submission+process 

- Tim

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[Monika Mevenkamp]

Tim 

thanks for the answer even if it is not what I hoped.

I am thinking of writing a command /main program that creates a collection with a given name, parent, authorizations and maps the newly created collection to a given form. 

The first part is easy enough - but mucking around in the input-forms.xml config file is a bit uncomfortable. For some reason I had assumed that these config files would be ‘moved’ to database tables.  I see I am wrong on that account too   :) 

What is your favorite XML Parser / Mangler class  to use for this kind input-formns.xml manipulation ? 

Related to this: is there a simple way that allows me to add a form/page  to the DSpace 5 JSPUI that accepts parameter values for a given curation task ? 

Monika 

[Tim Donohue]

Hi Monika,

Just a quick response to your first note... it's not out of the question that these configs will eventually move to the database (or somewhere similarly more easy to manage).  It just is not likely to happen in DSpace 7, as the concentration in DSpace 7 is on the new UI and REST API.  We very purposefully are *not* trying to change the DSpace API or backend configurations *except* in areas where we have to do so in order to support the new REST API or UI.  This is necessary in order to keep the scope of DSpace 7 manageable -- we simply cannot fix/change everything at once.  :) 

So, you are not wrong in your assumption that configuration will likely change in the future -- ideally, it will eventually be mostly manageable from an Admin UI (as is on the RoadMap [1]). But, that is not likely to happen immediately in DSpace 7...it'd be more likely to occur in DSpace 8.

As for your other questions, I'll leave them to others. I haven't used the JSPUI in some time, and I'll admit I'm not as much in the code these days. So, you might want to simply see which XML parser class is in use already where the input-forms.xml is being read by the Java API.

Good luck!

- Tim

[Claudia Jürgen]

Hello Monika,

we have split the input forms as a couple of collection/type specific
forms made it unwielding.
We kept the value-pairs in it and put the forms and form map in
different files
<?xml version="1.0" encoding='iso-8859-1' ?>
<!DOCTYPE input-forms SYSTEM "input-forms.dtd" [
<!ENTITY map SYSTEM "input-form-elements/form-map.xml">
<!ENTITY standardUniDo SYSTEM
"input-form-elements/de/form-standardUniDo.xml">
...

]>
<input-forms>
&map;
<form-definitions>
&standardUniDo;
...
</form-definitions>
...
</input-forms>

Hope this helps

Claudia Jürgen

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Claudia Juergen
Eldorado

Technische Universität Dortmund
Universitätsbibliothek
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[helix84]

Wow, I didn't know that was possible. Thanks for the tip, Claudia, I'm sure it will come in handy in the future.

I was going to suggest another solution but it has an extra step - to generate the xml from multiple xml files using XSLT. The xsl file would be just a skeleton which would include the secondary xml files. In Java you can choose from several xslt processors and there is at least one in the DSpace classpath already.

Regards,
~~helix84

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https://wiki.duraspace.org/display/DSPACE/Mailing+List+Etiquette

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[Mark H. Wood]

On Thursday, March 22, 2018 at 1:41:29 PM UTC-4, momeven wrote:

Can I split the input-forms.xml file into multiple files using some kind of include directive

I have not tried it in this application, but I wonder if XInclude would work?

[Claudia Jürgen]

I've tried it ages ago on a 3 or 4 instance and it did not work, thus
came up with the entity solution.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding='iso-8859-1' ?>
<!DOCTYPE input-forms SYSTEM "input-forms.dtd" [
<!ENTITY map SYSTEM "input-form-elements/form-map.xml">
<!ENTITY standardUniDo SYSTEM
"input-form-elements/de/form-standardUniDo.xml">
...

]>
<input-forms>
&map;
<form-definitions>
&standardUniDo;
...
</form-definitions>
...
</input-forms>

Cheers

Claudia

[Mark H. Wood]

On Friday, March 23, 2018 at 9:04:39 AM UTC-4, Claudia Jürgen wrote:

I've tried it ages ago on a 3 or 4 instance and it did not work, thus
came up with the entity solution.

That's useful to know.  A small adjustment to the parser configuration (to enable namespace support) might be required.

There was a question about external tools.  I was able to get 'xmllint --xinclude' to process a host document which refers to two XIncluded documents, and it merged them as desired.

mwood@mhw ~ $ cat host.xml
<?xml version='1.0'?>
<whole xmlns:xi='http://www.w3.org/2001/XInclude'>
 <xi:include href='part1.xml'/>
 <xi:include href='part2.xml'/>
</whole>
mwood@mhw ~ $ cat part1.xml
<?xml version='1.0'?>
<part1 thing='thing'/>
mwood@mhw ~ $ cat part2.xml
<?xml version='1.0'?>
<part2>
 <stuff>
  <nonsense/>
 </stuff>
</part2>
mwood@mhw ~ $ xmllint --xinclude host.xml
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<whole xmlns:xi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XInclude">
 <part1 thing="thing"/>
 <part2>
 <stuff>
  <nonsense/>
 </stuff>
</part2>
</whole>

So, one could do the merging manually, outside of DSpace, whenever one of the documents has changed.