Advanced Features

Christopher Hornbaker

    chrishornbaker@earthlink.net

# Advanced Features

This chapter outlines the advanced features of &quantaplus; and how to use them.

## &XML; Tools

The 3.2 release of &quantaplus; brings with it many new &XML; tools and features. The tools are unique in their integration within &quantaplus;. All of these tools use Kommander as a front-end and libxml2 and libxslt as a back-end. The combination of these makes for fast, efficient, productive, and complete tools.

### &kde; Documentation Tools

&quantaplus; supports &kde;'s two main documentation tools: `meinproc` and `checkXML`.

#### `meinproc`

Anyone who has worked with &kde; documentation knows `meinproc` and how superb it is. Well, take it up a notch with a great graphical interface! No longer resort to a shell; just click the icon that resembles a processor and you are done!

Current Working Folder

  This application expects an `index.docbook` file to be present in a folder. If `index.docbook` is in the current working folder, then simply leave Current Working Folder checked. If it is not, then uncheck Current Working Folder and enter the folder you wish to process in the Other Folder field.

Outputted files are placed in the same folder as the sources files. All &HTML; files are removed each time `meinproc` is ran.

#### `checkXML`

Again, anyone who has worked with &kde; documentation knows this helpful application. Again, &quantaplus; provides a great little graphical front-end to this one.

Current Working Folder

  If the currently opened file is the `index.docbook` file, then simply leave Current Working Folder checked. If it is not, then uncheck Current Working Folder and enter the folder of where `index.docbook` can be found.

Output

If there is output, then your file is invalid. Please correct the reported errors and try again.

### &XML; Validation

&quantaplus; has a great &XML; validation tool, which uses a `xmllint` back-end.

Current File

  If the file to be validated is currently focused on in &quantaplus;, then simply leave Current File checked. If it is not, then uncheck Current File and select the file to be validated from the Other File file selector.

Well-formed Checking

  If you only wish to know only if the file is well-formed, click the Well-formed Checking Only check box.

Definition &URI;

  If you are using a &DTD; and it is specified within the &XML; file, then select &DTD; (Internal) (default), else select &DTD; (External) and locate the &DTD; with the Definition &URI; file selector. Both &W3C; &XML; Schema and RelaxNG validation are required to be externally defined via the Definition &URI; file selector.

### &XSL; Processing

Yep, &quantaplus; has a &XSL; processing tool, too! This uses the `xsltproc` tool provided with libxml2.

Current File

  If the file to be processed is currently focused on in &quantaplus;, then simply leave Current File checked. If it is not, then uncheck Current File and select the file to be processed from the Other File selector.

Stylesheet

  Select the &XSL; file that you wish to be used.

Output file name

  Enter the name of the file that you want the resulting file to be called. File is outputed to your home folder by default.

This application lacks flexibility. Sorry, we will do better next time.

Using Plugins

Mathieu Kooiman

    quanta@map-is.nl

## Using Plugins

### What is a Plugin?

&quantaplus; is able to load plugins, which are KParts. The KPart framework is another very powerfull framework of &kde;. A KPart is a relativly small, reusable container of functionality. It allows &kde; developers to easily build on the work of other programmers. One example of this is &quantaplus; itself. The editor &quantaplus; uses is the &kate; KPart. The &kate; KPart already had a bunch of functionality that &quantaplus; needed, like syntax highlighting. Integrating it into &quantaplus; allowed the &quantaplus; developers to focus on what &quantaplus; should be able to do, rather than facing the many problems that developing a new editor KPart/component from scratch would bring.

The plugins &quantaplus; loads might have nothing to do with &quantaplus; itself. This makes it a very powerful plugin system. You can benefit from extra functionality and need not to wait until someone integrates it into &quantaplus;! The plugins can be loaded into a number of &GUI; elements. More on this below.

### Understanding the Edit Plugin Dialog

To install a Plugin or KPart we will work from the Plugins Edit menu. This will bring up the following dialog:

The Edit Plugin dialog.

This dialog lets you manage all defined plugins and lets you add new ones. We will describe each &GUI; element in here:

Search paths

  Here you can fill in a search path. When adding a plugin without a Location, &quantaplus; will search these paths to find the plugin.

Add

  This will bring up a dialog which allows you to add a new plugin.

Configure

  This will allow you to change the settings of a particular plugin.

Remove

  Removes the currently selected plugin.

Refresh

  Refreshes the dialog's contents.

&debugging-quanta;