is there an SVG expert in the house?

Report · Oct 12, 2015

with a vague view to something a bit like automation, I'm examining some very unexciting graphics … ladders/stacks of boxes with text labels in, usually two or three columns per graphic.

I told you they were unexciting :-}

It seems to me that something like this would be a good candidate for generated svg. I've got as far as writing a test-file, and I've hit a problem: FM and Illustrator take the file in their stride, but Mozilla and my currently-preferred DITA tool XML Mind complain. As far I can understand, they are not happy with the <use> option, which they feel ought to be an element …

If anyone in this generally knowledgeable forum can give me any help writing universally acceptable svg, or even can just confirm I'm on a hiding to nothing trying to use <use>, I'd be grateful. Sample code block follows, in case you need something to check.

<svg width="540" height="720" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" xmlns:svg="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg">
<defs>
<g id="boxes">
<rect id="lightBox1" x="3" y="0" height="17" width="108" stroke-weight="0.25px" fill="none" stroke="#ddd"/>
<rect id="lightBox2" x="144" y="0" height="17" width="108" stroke-weight="0.25px" fill="none" stroke="#ddd"/>
<rect id="lightBox3" x="288" y="0" height="17" width="108" stroke-weight="0.25px" fill="none" stroke="#ddd"/>
<rect id="greyBox1" x="3" y="0" height="17" width="108" stroke-weight="0.25px" fill="#eee" stroke="#ddd"/>
<rect id="greyBox2" x="144" y="0" height="17" width="108" stroke-weight="0.25px" fill="#eee" stroke="#ddd"/>
<rect id="greyBox3" x="288" y="0" height="17" width="108" stroke-weight="0.25px" fill="#eee" stroke="#ddd"/>
</g>
</defs>
<!-- boxes: y offset increments by 18 -->
<!-- col 1 top -->
<use y="0" xlink:href="#lightBox1" />
<use y="16" xlink:href="#greyBox1" />
<use y="34" xlink:href="#lightBox1" />
<use y="52" xlink:href="#lightBox1" />
<use y="70" xlink:href="#lightBox1" />
<use y="88" xlink:href="#lightBox1" />
</svg>

Report · Oct 12, 2015

cross-posting seemed legitimate, especially as the topic was outside the primary focus of everyday Framing … so here's the answer from the XML Mind support team: I needed an extra declaration to tell the processor about the <use> tag.

xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"

did the trick, and now I have a neat .svg graphic I can use both inside and outside FrameMaker.