XML in a Nutshell, 3rd Edition

Parameter Entity Syntax

A parameter entity reference is declared much like a general entity reference. However, an extra percent sign is placed between the <!ENTITY and the name of the entity. For example:

<!ENTITY % residential_content "address, footage, rooms, baths">
<!ENTITY % rental_content      "rent">
<!ENTITY % purchase_content    "price">

Parameter entities are dereferenced in the same way as a general entity reference, only with a percent sign instead of an ampersand:

<!ELEMENT apartment (%residential_content;, %rental_content;)>
<!ELEMENT sublet    (%residential_content;, %rental_content;)>
<!ELEMENT coop      (%residential_content;, %purchase_content;)>
<!ELEMENT condo     (%residential_content;, %purchase_content;)>
<!ELEMENT house     (%residential_content;, %purchase_content;)>

When the parser reads these declarations, it substitutes the entity’s replacement text for the entity reference. Now all you have to do to add an available_date element to the content specification of all five listing types is add it to the residential_content entity like this:

<!ENTITY % residential_content "address, footage, rooms,
                                baths, available_date">

The same technique works equally well for attribute types and element names. You’ll see several examples of this in the next chapter on namespaces and in Chapter 9.

This trick is limited to external DTDs. Internal DTD subsets do not allow parameter entity references to be only part of a markup declaration. However, parameter entity references can be used in internal ...