yet another submission (XTech 2006)
I've submitted a presentation proposal for XTech 2006: "XSieve: extending XSLT with the roots of XSLT".
Brief Session Description
XSLT has roots in DSSSL. DSSSL has roots in the Lisp dialect Scheme. Now, XSieve interweaves both XSLT and Scheme, forming a more powerful XML processing language. XSieve is one of the successful Google "Summer of Code" 2005 projects.
Abstract
XSieve is the code name for a technology of interweaving XSLT and the Lisp dialect Scheme. XSieve stylesheets consist of two modes -- XSLT and Scheme -- with the ability to switch between modes without limitations.
XSieve releases XSLT from its sandbox and makes it a general-purpose programming language. XSieve removes the need for complex and nonintuitive XSLT coding patterns for problems which are trivial for traditional programming languages.
The paper compares XSieve with alternative approaches to XML processing, such as writing XSLT extensions in conventional languages, or using new XML processing languages.
At present, XSieve is implemented as a plugin for the libxslt library, and thus available for the XSLT processor xsltproc and for libxslt bindings in different programming languages. The Scheme interpreter is Guile. XSieve can also be implemented for other XSLT processors and Scheme implementations.
Performance studies indicate no significant speed degradation in normal use; specially generated stylesheets with excessive switching between XSLT and Scheme modes may result in some performance degradation.
The paper shows practical use cases that are manageable with XSieve, but which are difficult for plain XSLT or other technologies.