Word Hacks [Electronic resources]

Hack 95 Batch-Process Word Documents with XSLT

This hack shows you how to use XSLT to compile a report containing information from several different WordprocessingML documents.

Thanks to WordprocessingML and the powers of XSLT, it is now straightforward to perform bulk processing on multiple Word documents. This particular hack is less about modifying the documents themselves (that's covered in [Hack #96] ) than about generating a report that aggregates information from multiple Word documents. In this case, you want to extract and total all of the Word comments from a variable number of input documents. The resulting report format is just another Word document.

Say you have five Word documents in WordprocessingML format in a folder called C:\Word Documents. The files are named as follows:

word1.xml

word2.xml

word3.xml

word4.xml

word5.xml

Each file contains multiple comments from multiple reviewers, and you'd like a list of all the comments from all the files (see Figure 10-10).

To get started, enter the following code in a standard text editor such as Notepad, save it in the same folder as the files with the comments, and name it file-list.xml:

<input-files>
<file>word1.xml</file>
<file>word2.xml</file>
<file>word3.xml</file>
<file>word4.xml</file>
<file>word5.xml</file>
</input-files>

To change the names of the files to be processed, just add to, modify, or delete the file elements.

10.7.1 The Code

To create the report, enter this code in a standard text editor such as Notepad, save it in the same folder as the other files, and name it bulk-report.xsl:

<xsl:stylesheet version="1.0"
xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform"
xmlns:w="http://schemas.microsoft.com/office/word/2003/wordml"
xmlns:aml="http://schemas.microsoft.com/aml/2001/core">
<xsl:variable name="input-docs" select="document(/input-
/image/library/english/10049_file)"/>
<xsl:variable name="all-comments"
select="$input-docs//aml:annotation[@w:type='Word.Comment']"/>
<xsl:template match="/">
<xsl:processing-instruction name="mso-application">
<xsl:text>prog</xsl:text>
</xsl:processing-instruction>
<w:wordDocument>
<xsl:attribute name="xml:space">preserve</xsl:attribute>
<w:body>
<w:p>
<w:r>
<w:rPr>
<w:sz w:val="32"/>
</w:rPr>
<w:t>Total # of files processed: </w:t>
<w:t>
<xsl:value-of select="count(input-/image/library/english
 /10049_file)"/>
</w:t>
<w:br/>
<w:t>Total # of comments: </w:t>
<w:t>
<xsl:value-of select="count($all-comments)"/>
</w:t>
</w:r>
</w:p>
<w:p/>
<xsl:for-each select="input-/image/library/english/10049_file">
<w:p>
<w:r>
<w:rPr>
<w:sz w:val="28"/>
</w:rPr>
<w:t>File: <xsl:value-of select="."/></w:t>
</w:r>
</w:p>
<xsl:apply-templates select="document(.)//aml:annotation
[@w:type='Word.Comment']"/>
</xsl:for-each>
</w:body>
</w:wordDocument>
</xsl:template>
<xsl:template match="aml:annotation">
<w:p>
<w:r>
<w:t>From <xsl:value-of select="@aml:author"/>:</w:t>
</w:r>
</w:p>
<xsl:copy-of select="aml:content/*"/>
<w:p/>
</xsl:template>
</xsl:stylesheet>

First, you create a few lines that look like headers, containing the total number of files processed and the total number of comments found:

<w:t>Total # of files processed: </w:t>
<w:t>
<xsl:value-of select="count(input-/image/library/english/10049_file)"/>
</w:t>
<w:br/>
<w:t>Total # of comments: </w:t>
<w:t>
<xsl:value-of select="count($all-comments)"/>
</w:t>

Next, you iterate through each of the file elements in the source document, outputting a pseudoheading to group the results by filename:

<xsl:for-each select="input-/image/library/english/10049_file">
<w:p>
<w:r>
<w:rPr>
<w:sz w:val="28"/>
</w:rPr>
<w:t>File: <xsl:value-of select="."/></w:t>
</w:r>
</w:p>
  ...
</xsl:for-each>

With the help of XSLT's document function, you then grab all the aml:annotation elements of the type Word.Comment from each input document:

<xsl:apply-templates select="document(.)//aml:annotation
[@w:type='Word.Comment']"/>

And for each comment, you display who authored the comment, followed by the text of the comment itself in a subsequent paragraph:

<xsl:template match="aml:annotation">
<w:p>
<w:r>
<w:t>From <xsl:value-of select="@aml:author"/>:</w:t>
</w:r>
</w:p>
xsl:copy-of select="aml:content/*"/>
<w:p/>
</xsl:template>

10.7.2 Running the Hack

To run this hack, enter the following at a DOS command prompt within the same folder as the files:

> msxsl file-list.xml bulk-report.xsl -o comment-report.xml

If you double-click the newly created file, comment-report.xml, you'll see a document like the one shown in Figure 10-10.

Evan Lenz