Simple XML Translator

Aaron Skonnard
Developmentor

Requirements

This sample requires the following software:

Internet Explorer 5.0
Windows 98, Windows NT 4.0, or Windows 2000
Microsoft Visual C++ 6.0

Description

This sample will demonstrate the basics of using MSXML to translate an XML document into another XML document that uses a slightly modified vocabulary. This would be useful for systems that need to interoperate but don’t use equivalent XML vocabularies to represent their data.

The Translator component consists of three methods:

Translate

Takes in an XML string and returns the resulting translated string.

Set obj = CreateObject("Translator.TranslateOrders")
MsgBox obj.Translate(xmlOrderString)

TranslateFileToFile

Takes in an XML file and saves the resulting translation to the specified output file.

Set obj = CreateObject("Translator.TranslateOrders")
obj.Translate "c:\xml\orders.xml", "c:\xml\neworders.xml"

TranslateFileToObject

Takes in an XML file and returns an DOMDocument object reference that contains the resulting translated XML tree.

Set obj = CreateObject("Translator.TranslateOrders")
set xmlDoc = obj.TranslateFileToObject("c:\xml\orders.xml")
MsgBox xmlDoc.documentElement.nodeName  ‘ prints "invoice"

The Translator component uses an internal XSL stylesheet to perform all translations. The stylesheet being used by the sample is contained in an embedded string resource with an ID of IDS_TRANSLATE_XSL (see the project resource file for details). translate.xsl also contains the same stylesheet used by the embedded resource, which may be easier for you to look at. Here is what the stylesheet looks like:

<xsl:stylesheet xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/TR/WD-xsl">

  <xsl:template>
    <xsl:copy>
      <xsl:apply-templates select="@*"/>
      <xsl:apply-templates/>
    </xsl:copy>
  </xsl:template>

  <xsl:template match="customer">
    <purchaser>
      <xsl:attribute name="name">
        <xsl:value-of select="lastname"/>, <xsl:value-of select="firstname"/>
      </xsl:attribute>
      <xsl:attribute name="phone">
        <xsl:value-of select="phone"/>
      </xsl:attribute>
    </purchaser>
  </xsl:template>

  <xsl:template match="order">
    <entry>
      <xsl:apply-templates select="@*"/>
      <xsl:apply-templates />
    </entry>
  </xsl:template>

  <xsl:template match="orders">
    <invoice>
      <xsl:apply-templates select="@*"/>
      <xsl:apply-templates />
    </invoice>
  </xsl:template>
  
  <xsl:template match="/">
     <xsl:apply-templates/>
  </xsl:template>

</xsl:stylesheet>

The component expects to receive a certain type of XML document containing orders and will translate it into a new XML orders document format. orders.xml contains a sample XML file that can be used:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<orders>
   <order id="1" itemcount="3">
      <customer id="100">
         <lastname>Skonnard</lastname>
         <firstname>Aaron</firstname>
         <phone>(888)888-8888</phone>
      </customer>
	  <item id="5000" type="software">
	     <manuf>Microsoft</manuf>
	     <pname>Microsoft Money 99</pname>
	     <price>39.99</price>
	     <quant>1</quant>
	     <total>39.99</total>
	  </item>
	  <item id="5010" type="software">
	     <manuf>Microsoft</manuf>
	     <pname>Internet Explorer 5.0</pname>
	     <price>0.00</price>
	     <quant>3</quant>
	     <total>0.00</total>
	  </item>
	  <item id="5101" type="book">
	     <manuf>Addison Wesley Longman</manuf>
	     <pname>Essential WinInet</pname>
	     <price>44.95</price>
	     <quant>2</quant>
	     <total>89.90</total>
	  </item>
	  <total>129.89</total>
   </order>
   <order id="2" itemcount="1">
      <customer id="101">
         <lastname>Seinfield</lastname>
         <firstname>Jerry</firstname>
         <phone>(999)999-9999</phone>
      </customer>
	  <item id="5002" type="software">
	     <manuf>Microsoft</manuf>
	     <pname>Microsoft Golf</pname>
	     <price>29.99</price>
	     <quant>1</quant>
	     <total>29.99</total>
	  </item>
	  <total>29.99</total>
   </order>
   <order id="3" itemcount="2">
      <customer id="102">
         <lastname>Stockton</lastname>
         <firstname>John</firstname>
         <phone>(777)777-7777</phone>
      </customer>
	  <item id="5301" type="sports">
	     <manuf>Wilson</manuf>
	     <pname>Basketball</pname>
	     <price>19.99</price>
	     <quant>1</quant>
	     <total>19.99</total>
	  </item>
	  <item id="5302" type="sports">
	     <manuf>Wilson</manuf>
	     <pname>Ping Golf Balls</pname>
	     <price>10.00</price>
	     <quant>3</quant>
	     <total>30.00</total>
	  </item>
	  <total>49.99</total>
   </order>
</orders>

To see what the translated XML document should look like, see transform.xml:

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<invoice>
   <entry id="1" itemcount="3">
      <purchaser name="Skonnard, Aaron" phone="(888)888-8888"/>
      <item id="5000" type="software">
         <manuf>Microsoft</manuf>
         <pname>Microsoft Money 99</pname>
         <price>39.99</price>
         <quant>1</quant> 
         <total>39.99</total>
      </item>
      <item id="5010" type="software">
         <manuf>Microsoft</manuf>
         <pname>Internet Explorer 5.0</pname>
         <price>0.00</price>
         <quant>3</quant>
         <total>0.00</total> 
      </item>
      <item id="5101" type="book">
         <manuf>Addison Wesley Longman</manuf>
         <pname>Essential WinInet</pname> 
         <price>44.95</price>
         <quant>2</quant>
         <total>89.90</total>
      </item>
      <total>129.89</total>
   </entry>
   <entry id="2" itemcount="1">
      <purchaser name="Seinfield, Jerry" phone="(999)999-9999"/>
      <item id="5002" type="software">
         <manuf>Microsoft</manuf>
         <pname>Microsoft Golf</pname>
         <price>29.99</price>
         <quant>1</quant>
         <total>29.99</total>
      </item>
      <total>29.99</total>
   </entry>
   <entry id="3" itemcount="2">
      <purchaser name="Stockton, John" phone="(777)777-7777"/>
      <item id="5301" type="sports">
         <manuf>Wilson</manuf>
         <pname>Basketball</pname>
         <price>19.99</price>
         <quant>1</quant>
         <total>19.99</total>
      </item>
      <item id="5302" type="sports">
         <manuf>Wilson</manuf>
         <pname>Ping Golf Balls</pname>
         <price>10.00</price>
         <quant>3</quant>
         <total>30.00</total>
      </item>
      <total>49.99</total>
   </entry>
</invoice>