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XML-Grammar-Fiction-v0.5.0
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/ XML::Grammar::Fiction

NAME

XML::Grammar::Fiction - CPAN distribution implementing an XML grammar and a lightweight markup language for stories, novels and other fiction.

VERSION

Version 0.5.0

SYNOPSIS

See XML::Grammar::Fiction::FromProto, XML::Grammar::Fiction::ToDocBook and XML::Grammar::Fiction::ToHTML.

DESCRIPTION

XML::Grammar::Fiction is a CPAN distribution that facilitates writing prose fiction (= stories, novels, novellas, etc.). What it does is:

1. Converting a well-formed plain text format to a specialized XML format.
2. Converting the XML to DocBook/XML or directly to HTML for rendering.

The best way to use it non-programatically is using XML::Grammar::Fiction::App::FromProto, XML::Grammar::Fiction::App::ToDocBook and XML::Grammar::Fiction::App::ToHTML, which are modules implementing command line applications for their processing.

In order to be able to share the common code and functionality more easily, then XML::Grammar::Screenplay, which provides similar XML grammar and text-based markup language for writing screenplays, is now included in this CPAN distribution, and you can refer to its documentation as well: XML::Grammar::Screenplay .

The rest of this page will document the syntax of the custom textual format.

FORMAT

Sections

Sections are placed in XML-like tags of <section> ... </section> or abbreviated as <s> ... </s>. Opening tags in the format may have attributes whose keys are plaintext and whose values are surrounded by double quotes. (Single-quotes are not supported).

The section tag must have an id attribute (for anchors, etc.) and could contain an optional (but highly recommended) <title> sub-tag. If the title is not specified, it will default to the ID.

Sections may be nested.

Text

Text is any of:

1. Plaintext

Regular text

2. XML-like tags.

Supported tags are <b> for bold text, and <i> for italic text.

3. Entities

The text format supports SGML-like entities such as &amp;, &lt;, &quot; and all other entities that are supported by HTML::Entities.

4. Supported initial characters

The following characters can start a regular paragraph:

  • Any alphanumeric character.

  • Some special characters:

    The characters " (double quotes), ' (single quotes), etc. are supported.

  • XML/SGML entities.

    XML/SGML entities are also supported at the start.

All other characters are reserved for special markup in the future. If you need to use them at the beginning of the paragraph you can escape them with a backslash (\) or their SGML/XML entity (e.g: &qout;).

Types of top-level items.

Paragraphs

These are not delimited by anything - just a paragraph of text not containing an empty line.

<ol>

This is an ordered list with <li>s, similar to its purpose in XHTML.

<ul>

An unordered list.

EXAMPLES

Examples can be found in the t/data directory, and here:

AUTHOR

Shlomi Fish, http://www.shlomifish.org/.

BUGS

Please report any bugs or feature requests to bug-xml-grammar-fiction at rt.cpan.org, or through the web interface at http://rt.cpan.org/NoAuth/ReportBug.html?Queue=XML-Grammar-Fiction. I will be notified, and then you'll automatically be notified of progress on your bug as I make changes.

TODO

  • Implement the correct handlind of leading special characters in lines.

  • Check that SGML entities work properly.

  • Convert the parsing errors from Carp::confess to Exception::Class

    This will allow a friendlier diagnostic. Carp::confess was implemented due to laziness on the programmers' part.

  • Merge the duplicate code from XML-Grammar-Fiction

    XML::Grammar::Fiction was forked from XML::Grammar::Screenplay and they still share a lot of common code. This needs to be merged in time.

  • Refactor the Prototext parser and other parts.

    Currently the code is relatively hairy and easy-to-break. Try to refactor it.

MOTIVATION

I (= Shlomi Fish) originated this CPAN distribution (after forking XML:Grammar::Screenplay which was similar enough) so I'll have a convenient way to edit a story I'm writing in Hebrew and similar fiction, as OpenOffice.org caused me many problems, and I found editing bi-directional DocBook/XML to be painful with either gvim or KDE 4's kate, so I opted for a more plain-texty format.

I hope a lightweight markup language like that for fiction (and possibly other types of manuscripts) will prove useful for other writers. At the moment, a lot of stuff in the proto-text format is subject to change, so you'll need to accept that some modifications to your sources will be required in the future. I hope you still find it useful and let me know if you need any feature or bug-fix.

SUPPORT

You can find documentation for this module with the perldoc command.

perldoc XML::Grammar::Fiction

You can also look for information at:

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

COPYRIGHT & LICENSE

Copyright (c) 2007, 2009 Shlomi Fish.

This program is released under the following license: MIT X11: http://www.opensource.org/licenses/mit-license.php .

LICENSE

Copyright (c) 2007, 2009 Shlomi Fish.

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.