xH: The new programming language you already know

Sidewinder supports the use of compound documents--documents that are made up of more than one mark-up language--to define internet applications.

To achieve this, XHTML 1.1 Modularisation is used to import languages such as SVG and XForms into XHTML. We use the term xH to describe the compound language. The xH schemas are available from our Subversion server at:

http://svn.x-port.net/svn/public/schemas/xH/

Whilst Sidewinder handles the wiring of these languages, the actual processing of the different languages that might be part of a compound document is handled by specific language processors, such as formsPlayer for XForms, or Adobe's SVG Viewer for SVG. More details are in the section Adding languages.

Examples are available in our Subversion repository:

a simple combination of SVG and MathML;
an analogue clock using SVG (the clock doesn't move on its own, but it does when combined with XForms via XBL in a later example).

Using oXygen to edit xH documents

If you use the oXygen editor, you can use the xH schemas to make it easier to edit documents that use XHTML plus XForms, SVG and MathML, by following the following steps:

Obtain a copy of the xH schemas. If you have installed Sidewinder then you will already have these. If not, use a Subversion client to download them from:
```
http://svn.x-port.net/svn/public/schemas/xH/
```
In oXygen open the Options menu.
Choose Preferences....
Open the Editor branch in the tree view.
Select the Default Schema Association option.
Click New to add a new association.
Set the following options (all others are defaulted):
- Namespace: http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml
- Root local name: html
- Schema URI: [location of your schemas]/xh.xsd
Click OK.
Click Apply.