Looking for: XML to Form - round trip editor

[Frank Einstein]

Looking for a tool that can edit an XML file in a browser. The basic requirement is that the XML file is rendered as an HTML form with editable fields (including add/delete, preferably in accordance with with the document's XSD/DTD or other schema definition). I don't mind the actual form of this tool - could be implemented as a JSP/Servlet, ASP component, or browser plug-in for local or remote XML file access. Alternatively, it doesn't have to be a web browser or HTML as the GUI, but it does need to be form-based (as opposed to element-tree based like most simple XML editors).

My initial feeling that something like this would be ubiquitous and freely available seems to have hit up against a different reality after a day of looking. Perhaps tool writers are waiting for standards to progress in this area (XForm ?). Perhaps I'm looking in the wrong places ?

As an example of what I'm looking for, the closest thing I've found is described in this series of articles :
http://www.xmlfiles.com/articles/michael/searchxml/default.asp (this example uses the Microsoft.XMLDOM asp component)

What's missing here is that the generated HTML form simply reflects the current XML document instance, and does not allow for modifications allowable by the XSD/DTD unless they are currently in the XML document instance. For example, it doesn't give a button to add an additional element, if this is allowed by the maxOccurrence in the XSD.

So what I want does this:
- open user-specified XML doc
- (optionally) open XSLT doc for custom GUI/form rendering
- open XSD or DTD doc
- render GUI form containing XML data in accordance with optional XSTL doc
- allow use of HTML/javascript(or other) controls to change/add/delete elements/paramenters/data etc., within the confines of the XSD/DTD
- transform form data back to XML format, valid per XSD/DTD, and save to disk

I've also briefly looked at the Cocoon XMLForms stuff (and related), but this seems too comprehensive for what I want... I don't want XML binding to Java objects/beans, I simply want something that will input/output back to/from the original XML file. Maybe there is a tool/sample/example within the Cocoon distribution that does this, but I haven't actually looked yet.

Any pointers welcome.

....

 

[skinhat]

Authentic from www.altova.com seems to do what your asking.

 

[rriv]

Perhaps http://bitfluxeditor.org/ is what you're looking for ?

R. Rivière

 

[skinhat]

Had a look at the bitflux site but doesn't give a very good overview of what bitflux is about. Do you know if it uses XSD to define the XML editor layout?

If it does then its a pity it only works with Mozilla.

 

[rriv]

Had a look at the bitflux site but doesn't give a very good overview of what bitflux is about. Do you know if it uses XSD to define the XML editor layout?

No, I don't. I also had real difficult to quickly understand how it works and exactly what for. From what I've seen, it makes extensive use of Mozilla capabilities for supporting XML, it's very nice. On the layout subject, I guess it rather uses CSS, but I'm not sure. I hope someone who's reading this may have more information...

Robert