Apache: The Definitive Guide, 3rd Edition

XML and Perl

Before you embark seriously on Cocoon, you might like to look at the FAQs (http://xml.apache.org/cocoon/faqs.html#faq-noant). This will give you some notion of the substantial size, complexity, and tentative condition of the intellectual arena in which you will operate.

If you don’t feel quite up to embarking on the Java adventure (which seems to one of us (PL) comparable with trying to walk a straight line from New York to the South Pole), but you still need to get to grips with XML, there are a large number of Perl packages on CPAN (http://search.cpan.org/search?mode=module&query=xml), which might produce useful results much faster. The interface between Perl and Apache is covered in Chapter 16 and Chapter 17. Another option, also hosted by the XML Apache Project, is AxKit (http://axkit.org), a Perl package for transforming and presenting information stored in XML.