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3.7 Using Entities to Include Files

Entities (both general and parameter) are particularly useful when used to include one file inside another.

3.7.1 Using General Entities to Include Files

Suppose you have some content for an XML book organized into files, one file per chapter, called chapter1.xml, chapter2.xml, and so forth, with a book.xml file that will contain these chapters.

In order to use the contents of these files as the values for your entities, you declare them with the SYSTEM keyword. This directs the XML parser to use the contents of the named file as the value of the entity.

Example 3-12. Using General Entities to Include Files

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd" [
<!ENTITY chapter.1 SYSTEM "chapter1.xml">
<!ENTITY chapter.2 SYSTEM "chapter2.xml">
<!ENTITY chapter.3 SYSTEM "chapter3.xml">
<!-- And so forth -->
]>

<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
  <!-- Use the entities to load in the chapters -->

  &chapter.1;
  &chapter.2;
  &chapter.3;
</html>

Warning: When using general entities to include other files within a document, the files being included (chapter1.xml, chapter2.xml, and so on) must not start with a DOCTYPE declaration. This is a syntax error because entities are low-level constructs and they are resolved before any parsing happens.

3.7.2 Using Parameter Entities to Include Files

Recall that parameter entities can only be used inside an XML context. Why then would you want to include a file within an XML context?

You can use this to ensure that you can reuse your general entities.

Suppose that you had many chapters in your document, and you reused these chapters in two different books, each book organizing the chapters in a different fashion.

You could list the entities at the top of each book, but this quickly becomes cumbersome to manage.

Instead, place the general entity definitions inside one file, and use a parameter entity to include that file within your document.

Example 3-13. Using Parameter Entities to Include Files

First, place your entity definitions in a separate file, called chapters.ent. This file contains the following:

<!ENTITY chapter.1 SYSTEM "chapter1.xml">
<!ENTITY chapter.2 SYSTEM "chapter2.xml">
<!ENTITY chapter.3 SYSTEM "chapter3.xml">

Now create a parameter entity to refer to the contents of the file. Then use the parameter entity to load the file into the document, which will then make all the general entities available for use. Then use the general entities as before:

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd" [
<!-- Define a parameter entity to load in the chapter general entities -->
<!ENTITY % chapters SYSTEM "chapters.ent">

<!-- Now use the parameter entity to load in this file -->
%chapters;
]>

<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
  &chapter.1;
  &chapter.2;
  &chapter.3;
</html>

3.7.3 For You to Do…

3.7.3.1 Use General Entities to Include Files

Create three files, para1.xml, para2.xml, and para3.xml.

Put content similar to the following in each file:
```
<p>This is the first paragraph.</p>
```

Edit example.xml so that it looks like this:

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd" [
<!ENTITY version "1.1">
<!ENTITY para1 SYSTEM "para1.xml">
<!ENTITY para2 SYSTEM "para2.xml">
<!ENTITY para3 SYSTEM "para3.xml">
]>

<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
  <head>
    <title>An Example XHTML File</title>
  </head>

  <body>
    <p>The current version of this document is: &version;</p>

    &para1;
    &para2;
    &para3;
  </body>
</html>

Produce example.html by normalizing example.xml.

% xmllint --dropdtd --noent example.xml > example.html

Load example.html into your web browser, and confirm that the paran.xml files have been included in example.html.

3.7.3.2 Use Parameter Entities to Include Files

Note: You must have taken the previous steps first.

Edit example.xml so that it looks like this:

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd" [
<!ENTITY % entities SYSTEM "entities.ent"> %entities;
]>

<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
  <head>
    <title>An Example XHTML File</title>
  </head>

  <body>
    <p>The current version of this document is: &version;</p>

    &para1;
    &para2;
    &para3;
  </body>
</html>

Create a new file, entities.ent, with this content:

<!ENTITY version "1.1">
<!ENTITY para1 SYSTEM "para1.xml">
<!ENTITY para2 SYSTEM "para2.xml">
<!ENTITY para3 SYSTEM "para3.xml">

Produce example.html by normalizing example.xml.

% xmllint --dropdtd --noent example.xml > example.html

Load example.html into your web browser, and confirm that the paran.xml files have been included in example.html.

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