In the future, choose a better subject line than just "help".

> I'm brand new to XSL and I am complitely lost.
> Can anybody direct me to on-line material and manuals on XSL?

OFFICIAL SPECS
==============

A basic understanding of XML 1.0 is necessary before diving into XSL. The
XML 1.0 Recommendation is at http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-xml and there are many
books and online resources that will help you understand XML. It will also
help to understand Namespaces in XML, http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-xml-names

The latest drafts of the main XSL related specs can be found at:
XPath: http://www.w3.org/TR/xpath
XSLT: http://www.w3.org/TR/WD-xslt
XSL: http://www.w3.org/TR/WD-xsl

You might find these of interest as well:
http://www.w3.org/TR/xml-stylesheet
http://www.w3.org/TR/WD-xptr


TUTORIALS
=========

The XSL Chapter from Elliotte Rusty Harold's XML Bible is a very good free
resource. It is located at
http://metalab.unc.edu/xml/books/bible/updates/14.html

Crane Softwrights Ltd has a nice tutorial called Practical Transformation
Using XSLT and XPath, which I found extremely helpful. Part of it is free,
but the whole thing will cost you $40. It's well worth it, IMHO. You get
free updates. http://www.cranesoftwrights.com/training/


XSL NEWS AND SOFTWARE
=====================

The official specs for XSL, XSLT, and XPath make more sense after you have
read the tutorials and experimented with up-to-date tools. Lars Garshol
maintains an annotated list of XML related software, including XSL tools, at
http://www.stud.ifi.uio.no/~larsga/linker/XMLtools.html

Robin Cover's SGML/XML Web Page has an exhaustive list of all things related
to XSL. The URL is http://www.oasis-open.org/cover/xsl.html

The W3C maintains a little XSL news, info and software page at
http://www.w3.org/Style/XSL/

And finally, pay attention to this mailing list. Good stuff here.


 XSL-List info and archive:  http://www.mulberrytech.com/xsl/xsl-list