Using Prolog for Transforming XML Documents
This work addresses XML transformation for developers, but it is incremental as it builds on existing Prolog and XSLT methods without introducing a new paradigm.
The paper tackled the problem of transforming XML documents by proposing a tuProlog-styled interpreter to parse XML into Prolog lists and serialize them back, comparing it to XSLT based on criteria like language features and usability. The result was an assessment of when Prolog allows reversible transformations, but no concrete performance numbers or benchmarks were provided.
Proponents of the programming language Prolog share the opinion Prolog is more appropriate for transforming XML-documents as other well-established techniques and languages like XSLT. In order to clarify this position this work proposes a tuProlog-styled interpreter for parsing XML-documents into Prolog-internal lists and vice versa for serialising lists into XML-documents. Based on this implementation a comparison between XSLT and Prolog follows. First, criteria are researched, such as considered language features of XSLT, usability and expressibility. These criteria are validated. Second, it is assessed when Prolog distinguishes between input and output parameters towards reversible transformation.