Regarding XSLT difficulties.
Karthik, you are not the only person who found XSLT difficult to understand.
This quote is from
Rescuing XSLT from Niche Status. A Gentle Introduction to XSLT through HTML Templates http://www.xfront.com/rescuing-xslt.html :
�As a programmer with more than 20 years experience with over a dozen languages, XSLT templates and default rules were not obvious to me. Over the past year or two I had looked at numerous examples trying to discern how they worked. While I could understand the general gist of what was occurring, there was too much implied behavior that I did not pick up. It was not until going through formal XSLT training that I fully understood how XSLT worked. Clearly if the barrier to entry is that high for a heavily experienced programmer, the average web developer is not going to find this technology very useful.�
The Problem I thought why is XSLT difficult and found two main reasons:
1) XSL language is declarative, while most programmers work with imperative langiuages and, therefore, have to change all their mental framework.
And even if you have experience with declarative languages (like SQL or HTML), XSLT still can be difficult because it employ such concepts as �data driven� vs. �logic driven� control, which are (in my possible wrong opinion) absent in other declarative languages.
2) XSLT is seldom explained well. Most of books and articles I read simply follow W3C specifications and describe one XSLT element after another and one its parameter after another... It is useful if you already built correct mental framework and want to figure out quickly what some specific parameter does. If you did not, it may only confuse you.
The Solution 
I found this free chapter from
Professional Visual Basic 6 XML particularly useful:
Doing XPath and XSLT with Style! As for �real� books, Khun Yee Fung�s �XSLT. Working with XML and HTML� is very good! It explains flow of control and how XPath expressions work very detailed and with lots of examples.
You should feel much better after reading it!
[This message has been edited by Mapraputa Is (edited April 02, 2001).]
